
Class 
Book 



Title 



Imprint 



IS— 27179-1 GPO 



SHORT SERMONS 



FOR 



DAILY LIFE 



BY 



Stephen M. Paulson 




GRIT PUBLISHING CO. 

WILLIAMSPORT, PA. 
1907 



V 



/A^^ 

^\-,^ 



rG«^AJ»yo? CONGRESS 

OCT la »30f 

^ CopyngM Efrtiy 

0l5$s4 ' aaO., «s. 



Copyright, 1907 

by 

Grit Publishing Co. 



Contents 



The Average Man 

The New Year 

The Gospel of Work 

The Family and the Home 

The Thorn in the Flesh 

Seed-Time and Harvest 

The Festival of Joy 

Where is Thy Brother? 

Thy Kingdom Come 

The Value of Heroic Deeds 

Christ in Life and Thought 

The Silver Lining 

The Face of Christ 

Hurry and Happiness 

Jesus Passing By 

Woman's Ministry 

Thanksgiving 

The Weak Spot 

Helping or Hindering 

The Dreamer and His Dreams 

The First Christmas Carol 

Walking With God 

Growing Old 

The City Eternal 



%\tt ^iMtxast flpan 



He also that had received two talents came and said, Lord, Thou deliveredst unto ma 
two talents: behold I have grained two other talents besides them. — Matt, xxv: 22. 

^^^^^ HOUGH we have often read the parable of the talents, we 
M (r\ have scarcely noticed the middle character — the man with 
m^ J the two talents. Our minds have been occupied with the 
^^■^^ five-talent man who gained other five talents, and the one- 
talent man who buried his talent in the ground. The two-talent man 
has seemed to be placed there just to round out the parable. Yet 
I am inclined to think that this seemingly unimportant personage 
is the most important for consideration, because he represents the 
average individual. There are few persons of exceptionally brilliant 
endowments. Most of us are two-talent men. 

Here in America the "average man" is in the majority, and some 
day it flashes upon us that you and I belong to that vast majority. 
That may be a critical moment in our careers. Up to that moment 
we have been so full of ambition, mixed, possibly, with a little con- 
ceit, that we believed our powers unlimited, and everything possible. 
We have made all sorts of excuses to ourselves for being still in a 
minor position. "Wait," we said, "our time will come; we are not 
yet old enough; we have not had our opportunity. When it does 
come we shall astonish the world." 

Then one day something happens — our failure in a great attempt, 
the promotion over us of a younger man, the quiet ignoring of our 
person — and it comes upon us with stunning force that the whole 
world rates us only as fair to average. 

Now, it is just at this critical point that the average man needs 
encouragement, and is least likely to get it. If he confides to some- 
one his ambition to achieve great things, he will probably be laughed 
at. Sympathy for his early ambitions and dreams he must not look 
for. And now it rests with him whether he shall rise above or fall 
below that undistinguished plane of the average man. Let him read 
over the Parable of the Pounds and see in the two-talent man who 
made a success of his life, a possible picture of himself. 

First I notice that the man in the parable did not sit down and 
enviously complain because he was given less than one-half as much 
as his fellow servant. He did not talk of "equality," and "common 
ownership," and "unfair discrimination," and raise an agitation to 
compel his master to give him as much. No; he simply went to 
work with his two talents and he accomplished with them propor- 
tionately as much as the five-talent man — that is, he doubled them. 
The work of the world is being done by the average man. 
Master minds and great leaders of men are few. The world needs 
them occasionally and then they appear. But the work of the world 
must be done day after day through all the ages, and it is being done 
by the faithful two-talent man. As has been truthfully said, "there is 
not to-day a more inspiring sight, than to see a man start in life with 
ordinary capacity, and see his powers grow under his faithful use." 



ttSe ^beuQe 9$an 



How shall I make the most of what I have? How shall I double 
my mental, moral or spiritual stock? Plainly, according to Jesus, by 
use. Paradoxical as it may sound, the more we expend, the more we 
have; the more we give, the more we receive. 

Gibbon was considered an average writer — a two talent man. He 
worked twenty years on one book, and his "Decline and Fall of the 
Roman Empire," will live as long as literature lasts. Noah Webster 
was not considered an extraordinary man by his fellow townsmen. 
He gave 36 years to one book and he will ever be known as a great 
lexicographer. Newton was not considered a genius when he lived; 
and we might extend the list infinitely, of persons whom we remem- 
ber because they used to the utmost their moderate capacities. 

"Thou hast been faithful over a few things," said the master to 
his servant. After all, it is faithfulness in little things that counts in 
life. Who will trust you with great matters if you have been found 
unfaithful in small ones? Who will make you a master if you have 
been an unfaithful apprentice? Who will set you a ruler over cities if 
you cannot rule your own temper? 

Oh, my friends! let us not blame Providence for bestowing few 
talents, or environment and circumstances, and assert that we cannot 
rise to anything better and nobler than we are now. The man who 
uses aright his talents rises superior to circumstances. We generally 
think that the city man has many advantages over others, yet atten- 
tion has been called to the fact that the majority of our cities are 
being ruled by men whose childhood and youth were spent in the 
country. A recent canvass of prominent men in New York city shows 
that eighty-five per cent, were reared in the villages and rural districts. 
Nineteen of our twenty-six presidents came from the country. A 
census of the colleges and seminaries in and about Chicago showed 
that the country is supplying eighty per cent, of our college students. 

Let us realize as we have never done before, our possibilities. 
You and I may be only two-talent men, but our lives pass out of the 
commonplace and take on added dignity and value in the light of the 
things we may accomplish if we are faithful. 

Jesus in His work did not pick out the men of brilliant parts, the 
five-talent men. His work was done indiscriminately among the wise 
and foolish. He set Himself as the pattern to one as well as to the 
other, showing thereby that He believed in the possibility of higher 
manhood for every being to whom God has given a soul. 

Jesus was always encouraging men to make the best use of their 
lives. "Be faithful in that which is least. Attain a worthy and noble 
manhood with the materials in hand, and greater things shall be 
entrusted to you." With that determination go forth to to-morrow's 
toil and cares, to its joys and sorrows, and they shall all weave them- 
selves into the texture of your finer and nobler manhood. And when 
the end of the day is come the great commendation shall be yours: 
"Well done, good and faithful servant. Because thou hast been faithful 
over a few things I will make thee ruler over many things." 



%\)t il5eto gear 




Come in, thou blessed of the Lord, for I have prepared the house. — Gen. xxiv: 31. 

T the doorway o£ Bethuel's house stands a traveler, weary 
and dust stained. His camels are kneeling under their bur- 
dens. Laban comes and extends the invitation, "Come in, 
thou blessed of the Lord, for I have prepared the house." 
At our doorway at this season stands Jesus of Nazareth, in all the 
meekness and lowliness of a little child and seeks entrance. "Behold, 
I stand at the door and knock." Let us throw open the doors of our 
homes and hearts and say: "Come in, thou blessed of the Lord, for I 
have prepared the house." 

At our threshold stands the New Year. It comes new, pure and 
unstained from the hand of God, bearing richest treasures of oppor- 
tunities, hopes and aspirations. It will probably bring some sorrows 
and disappointments, but it brings an overflowing measure of God's 
love and much happiness to His children. Let us open our doors to 
the New Year and exclaim: "Come in, thou blessed of the Lord, for 
I have prepared the house." 

What a mystery is Time. It is older than the mountains, and 
yet it is ever young. It seems at times to move with leaden feet, and 
yet it is swifter than the weaver's shuttle. The years stretching before 
us seem endless, but ere we are aware of it, they have flown like mo- 
ments. A wonderful stream is the river of time. We live on its 
banks and note not its swiftness. But it flows on ceaselessly with 
a faultless rhythm and a broader sweep and a surge sublime as it 
blends with the ocean of years. 

Time is the true leveller. Before it all distinctions vanish. Rich 
and poor, prince and pauper bow beneath his yoke. Time has a keen 
tooth. He gnav/s the very rocks into decay, and the works of man 
soon return unto the dust. Looking out upon the desert of Sahara 
stands the pyramids as they have stood for more than forty centuries. 
They were built to outlast eternity, but Time will still be young when 
they are but a memory. 

Another year is passing out of our lives. 

"Ring out the old, ring in the new 
Ring happy bells across the snow 
The year is going, let him go: 
Ring out the false, ring in the true." 

And as the bells greet the new year, would that they might 

"Ring out the grief that saps the mind 
For those that here we see no more, 
Ring out the feud of rich and poor, 
Ring in redress to all mankind." 

Long ago Jesus stood up in the little synagogue at Nazareth and 
read: "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because He has 
anointed me to preach the gospel unto the poor — to proclaim the 
acceptable year of the Lord." Once more this is being fulfilled. Out 
of the sea of eternity another year is given unto us. Let us bless it 
at its birth. "Come in, thou blessed of the Lord." 



^^t iI5eto gear 



Let me write to the eyes and hearts of our younger people. 
Youth is prodigal of time, and the wise man regrets nothing more 
than the days and years which he has wasted. Remember that each 
day is the best day of the year as it dawns upon you. My young 
friends, shall this year be an acceptable year of the Lord? Yes, you 
say, but I am so frail and easily led, and temptations come so thick 
and fast. Don't give up the battle before it is fought, but determine 
that this new year shall see you give up some wasteful, foolish or 
wicked habit, shall see you wrestle persistently with some besetting 
sin. That this year you will take up some duty you have shirked, will 
draw away from some companionship which is tainting your character, 
will make amends for some wrong you have done, will renew some 
friendships which have been broken for no sufficient cause. 

We are accustomed to smile at New Year resolutions because 
they are so evanescent. Many people at this time want to turn over 
a new leaf. It is pretty sure to be like the old one, blotted and stained 
with shortcomings unless we open the door to the Master as well as 
to the New Year and say: "Come in, thou blessed of the Lord." 
Resolutions dependent on God's strength win. That was a wise say- 
ing of Dr. Johnson: "I have been resolving these fifty-five years, now 
I take hold on God." 

We stand at this time as on a mountain summit looking out into 
the future. Let us turn and look over the past, over all the way 
which the Lord God has led us. See how difficulties you feared so 
greatly have vanished, how evils which you dreaded have been turned 
into good, how you have been led by a loving hand like a child in the 
dark. Perhaps some one whom you love dearly has been brought 
to the door of death and saved to you. Perhaps this has been a year 
of great prosperity. Surely, it has been a year of numberless bless- 
ings. Let us therefore bid farewell to the old year with thankful 
hearts to God for his mercies, and let us meet the New Year with 
hope and faith and say: "Come in, thou blessed of the Lord for I 
have prepared the house." 

And as we consecrate the New Year in prayer, let us hope that 
it may see peace upon earth and good will among men; that it may 
see the victory of justice over oppression, of righteousness over wrong, 
that it may see honesty in public and private office and mercy and 
charity to all mankind. That it may see the making of just laws, and 
honest men to administer the same; and that it may bring the voider 
extension of God's Kingdom. May the New Year bells 

"Ring out old shapes of foul disease, 
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold, 
Ring out the thousand wars of old, 
Ring in the thousand years of peace. 

"Ring in the valiant man and free. 
The larger heart, the kindlier hand; 
Ring out the darkness of the land, 
Ring in the Christ that is to be." 

To you, friends, who read these lines may the New Year be a 
blessed year, filled to overflowing with God's goodness, a year of pros- 
perity and of larger and nobler manhood and womanhood. 



%fft (Bo&^ti of Wioxk 



For the Son of Man is as a man taking a far journey, who left his house, and grave 
authority to his servants, and to every man his work. — Mark xiii: 84. 

^--g-j^ ORK is an eternal law of God's universe. God blessed us 
m ■ ■ richly when he filled the earth with good things for our 
^ ■ ^ sustenance, for our use and for our pleasure, but He blessed 
^^^ us even in a greater measure when He declared that we 
should not enjoy these things without effort on our part. 

Probably every third man thinks he is a drudge, and every second 
woman at times is sure that she is. We are all in agreement on the 
subject of the blessedness of work, but to many of us our particular 
work is not congenial. We did not choose our calling, but were 
dropped into it by circumstances or came to it by heredity, as Jesus 
came to the carpenter's trade. With many of us the wheels of daily 
duty therefore, run in the rut of daily drudgery. But blessed be 
drudgery, for it is the basis of culture! 

"What," you say, "this tread-mill which is wearing me out, this 
daily grind, this plod that is so wearisome — can it be a blessing? 
Keeping house, or keeping accounts, teaching school, weighing sugar 
and tea behind the counter, these overalls in the machine shop — have 
these things anything to do with culture? Culture means leisure, 
elegance, time and a pocketbook. Drudgery means crowded hours, 
chronic worry, old clothes, black hands and headaches. Culture means 
college life; real life for most of us means a daily paper and a m.onthly 
magazine. Our real and our ideal are not twins. I love books, but the 
clothes basket wants me. I crave an out-door life — and I walk down 
town and perch on a high stool all day. I love nature — figures are my 
fate. I am not young any more, getting gray over the ears, and would 
like to sit down and rest, but the drive of business keeps me going 
continually at high pressure." 

So goes the grumble within the silent breast of many a person, 
whose pluck never lets it escape in words like these save occasionally 
of a tired evening; and there is often truth and justice in the grumble. 
And still, from this drudgery you are gaining culture, the very funda- 
mentals of fine manhood and womanhood. 

What are the fundamentals without which no other culture worth 
winning, is even possible? Attention to duty, industry, promptness, and 
accuracy, perseverance, courage and cheer under straining burdens, 
self-control, honesty and temperance. These are prime elements; 
these are fundamentals, and we get them from the day's task which 
we often call drudgery. When we were small mother had a way of 
harping on these things. She tried to tuck them into us as she tucked 
us into bed; and these are the things which nations pack into their 
proverbs. 

Now, how do we get these fundamentals of life and character? 
School and college may do much for us, but these things are not on 
the programme, as a rule. How, then, do we get them? We get them 
something like the hills and valleys get their grace and beauty. Their 



%ie C^o^pel ot motli 



fine lines came only by long chiselings, and steady pressure, only by 
ages of glacier-grind, by centuries of flood and storm and sun. These 
rounded the hills and scooped the valley curves. It was a work of 
"drudgery" all over the land. Mother Nature was down on her knees 
doing her early scrubbing work. That was yesterday; to-day we 
have the laughing landscape. 

The same is true of every man and woman on the earth. Beauty 
and strength of character is rubbed and scrubbed into us by the daily 
task which must be done. It is because we have to go morning after 
morning, through rain or shine, through headache and heartache to do 
the appointed work; because we must stick to it eight or ten hours; 
because good temper must be kept with the children, with customers 
and neighbors "seventy times seven," because our besetting sin must 
be watched to-day and to-morrow; in fact it does not matter so much 
what the work may be, but it is by the rut and grind of that work, that 
we gain these fundamentals of character. 

Look over the list again and ask yourself: Are there any qualities 
in the list which I can afford to spare? Not one. Cannot I get them 
some other way, without undergoing steady drill and pressure? No, 
there is no other way. The daily task is the great schoolmaster of 
life, and God has appointed "unto every man his work." 

Here let me say to all young people that the angel of success is 
the angel of work. You may have given up the extravagant dreams 
of your earlier years, but you never give up the dream of success; 
for success means putting the best elem.ents of your life into your 
work, and getting the best elements of character out of it. "Genius 
is the infinite power of taking pains," far more than it is a special 
gift bestowed upon certain men. 

The "Gospel of Work" seems a hard gospel, but God is using it 
for the salvation of mankind. Let every man who is employed in 
honest, useful work, thank God, and let him believe that he is serving 
humanity and serving his God. If you cannot feel that your work is 
honest work, then get out of it, for then it is unalloyed drudgery. 
Every man should be an artist in his work, whether he paints pictures 
or cobbles shoes. Michael Angelo said: "Nothing makes the soul 
so pure, so religious, as the endeavor to create something perfect, for 
God is perfection and whoever strives for it strives for something that 
is God-like." 

And surely the reward shall be to the worker. There was a little 
daughter of the tenements whose portion was poverty and labor. 
Often her feet were bare, her clothes ragged, and her hands were 
always hard and cracked from toil. The day came when the frail body 
could no longer stand the strain and she laid down to die. A friend 
sat by her bedside and told her of the Master who rests the heavy- 
laden. "But I have not been able to go to church," she said. "I had no 
clothes and I was needed at home. What shall I say when the Master 
asks me about it?" "Don't say anything when you come into His 
presence," was the answer, "just show Him your hands." 



%\it familv anU tl)e tome 

Except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it.-i-Ps. cxxvii: 1. 

^ T^ * HE family is the first divine circle of society. It is the 
m C^ foundation and pattern of all other human society; of the 
fL^ J tribe, of the nation, of the race. It is God's first institution 
^^■^^ for the human race. God was present at the first marriage, 
sanctified it and pronounced the blessing. 

The family is still God's ideal of human society and has never 
given place to any other; and it stands to-day as the fairest possession 
left to us out of the wreck of Paradise. It is God's institution for the 
creation of the social conscience. Within the family circle habits are 
formed which last to the end of life and make up character, and char- 
acter is formed which makes a man's destiny. 

V/e find the subject of marriage which should be a sacred thing 
to every right minded man and woman, often treated in a frivolous 
and joking manner. The marriage relation is entered into thought- 
lessly, and without due consideration of the importance of the step 
which is being taken. Yet there is no subject in the world which should 
be treated more solemnly than that of marriage and the home. 

Happiness in the home depends upon one thing, and that is the 
right relation between husband and wife. All other things are of 
minor consequence. Wealth and position take secondary places as 
happiness producers. In how many homes were not the early years of 
struggle the happiest years, the years when there was perfect confi- 
dence and mutual helpfulness between husband and wife; when no 
external interests had entered to mar the true conjugal relations. 

Let it therefore be impressed upon every young man and woman 
who contemplate entering the sacred relation of matrimony that "ex- 
cept the Lord build the house, they labor in vain that build it." For mar- 
riage is a divine institution, not only a civil contract, and its seculariza- 
tion in our land is an evil of which we are reaping the fruits in our 
divorce courts. How many broken vows and desecrated ly)mes, how 
many motherless or fatherless children, how many ruined lives of 
women who were once pure and noble girls, how many unhappy 
years of men who once had hoped for a home where love and comfort 
might reign and where children might grow into true manhood and 
womanhood! Was God ever taken into account in the building of 
those homes? A house built in defiance of the laws of gravitation, of 
material and of mechanics would not stand long. Neither does a 
home built in defiance of the laws of God. 

The greatest and most difficult of all sciences is the science of 
right living, and it begins and ends in the home. To the Christian 
family the country must look for its welfare, and not to laws and 
legislatures and resources. In vain you place a watchman at every 
street corner and at every cross road. A nation cannot be formed of 
men who must be watched at every turn. The home trains the men of 
the nation. Fathers of households are the men to whom the country 
looks for its strength; mothers of children are the women to whom the 



^"bt JFamilp ann tje l^ome 



country looks for the training o£ a nobler and a more Christian gener- 
ation. Therefore it is that our best men have taken alarm at the great 
and shameful evil which threatens our homes and our manhood — the 
thousands of divorces which occur yearly in our land. 

The history of the home is yet to be written. Our libraries are 
full of histories of war, commerce, literature and religion. But who 
has written the history of those rich affections and the virtues of 
heart and mind which turn a house into a home, light the sacred fire of 
love upon the hearth, and make the rooms to resound with the glad 
voices of children. Yet the history of progressive civilization is to a 
great extent the history of fireside, affection. For the home fields are 
sown and harvests reaped; for the home ships set sail and return 
again; for the home spindles whirl and shuttles fly and wheels turn 
round; for the home laws are made to be just, property secure and 
life safe. To millions of young men and maidens in the land comes 
the dream of a home to be a center of peace and love and security; 
a home built by God himself upon the foundation of the abiding affec- 
tion of two human hearts. That vision urges them to be as brave and 
true and worthy as the home is to be bright and beautiful and holy, 
for in their hearts they know that "except the Lord build the house, 
they labor in vain that build it." 

The whole philosophy of the relation between husband and wife 
in the home was written by St. Paul in his letter to the Ephesians, 
v. 22-25. Part of it some women, who do not understand it, want left 
out of the marriage service. It is true that Paul wrote: "Wives, sub- 
mit yourselves unto your husbands," but he also wrote: "Husbands, 
love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church." The position 
of the wife is subjection to love and to nothing else. Let no man 
talk about his authority in the hom.e until he has won the right to 
authority by self-sacrificing love such as the love of Christ for the 
church. It is when a man spends himself, pours himself out, forgets 
himself in his devotion to his home and family, that he has won the 
everlasting authority of self-sacrificing love. A home built in the 
love of God is the most sacred spot upon the earth; and as we will 
never find a better name for God than "Father," so we shall never 
find a better name for heaven than "Home." 

John Howard Payne overtaken by misfortune, poverty and sick- 
ness, one stormy night, staggered through the streets of Paris. As he 
passed a house the door opened and the light streamed out into the 
street, and Payne had a vision of a beautiful home and wife and 
happy children ready to welcome the husband and father, who ap- 
peared on the threshold. That night in his empty garret with the 
rain beating upon the roof, Payne had a vision of his old home 
across the seas. He saw again the warm smile of his mother, heard 
his honored father's voice and felt a glow at his heart to which it 
had been a stranger for many years. And so with streaming eyes and 
with radiant face, he wrote: "There is no place like home," and sang 
his immortal song of hope and of home and of heaven. 



Clje Cl)orn in tl)e iflesl) 



And lest I should be exalted above measure throurb the abundance of the revelations, 
there was given to me a thorn in the flesh. . , . Most gladly therefore will I rather 
glory in my infirmities. — II Cor. xii: 7-9. 

^ mm ^ HAT different things men glory in. One glories in his wis- 
■ ■ ■ ^om and learning, another in his strength, another in his 
\ M X P®^®'^ °^ speech, another in his skill, another in abounding 
^^^ health, another in his wealth. One man glories in his 
accomplishments, another in being the recognized leader of multi- 
tudes, while another man glories in an easy and quiet life. I hope that 
every man has somewhat in his life which he feels is excellent and 
wherein he may glory, for we all have infirmities and shortcomings 
which we desire to conceal. 

But here is a man who glories in his infirmities. The man is St. 
Paul. Had he nothing else to glory in? Yes, he says he will also 
glory in his sufferings. Read the catalogue of them in the eleventh 
chapter of II Corinthians. "Of the Jews I received five times forty 
stripes save one; etc." Now, it seems from that catalogue of sufferings 
and hardships which St. Paul endured that he must have been a man of 
magnificent physique. On the contrary he was a man small of stature. 
Not a man who would command attention by his appearance. Further- 
more he was suffering from some chronic ailment which at times inca- 
pacitated him for his work. 

Some peoples* troubles are mostly imaginary. Out of a passing 
disadvantage they evolve a dirge of agony. They imagine the smiling 
landscape to be a howling wilderness because they have been stung 
by a thistle. So physicians tell us that many people suffer greatly 
from wholly imaginary ailments. But St. Paul was not the man to 
exaggerate. His ailment was a thorn, a stake that pierced to his 
innermost being. It touched him in the tenderest spot because it 
interfered with his work. 

Our "thorns in the flesh" are of many sorts and how differently 
we bear them. It may be some deformity or disfigurement of body, 
some infirmity of utterance or hearing, or it may be business misfor- 
tune. Probably all of us have a specially tender spot, and by the irony 
of life that is the spot which is pierced. It is the painter's hand that is 
paralyzed, it is the singer's voice that fails, the handsome face is disfig- 
ured, the orator's tongue is palsied, the athlete's body is maimed. 
Sooner or later we all come into the fellowship of suffering. Fox 
wrote his "Book of Martyrs." Someone wrote a book entitled "Mar- 
tyrs Omitted by Fox." What an army that must be. An army of un- 
recorded heroes who have borne their "thorn in the flesh" without 
murmuring. 

St. Paul's trouble was unutterable. He never told what his par- 
ticular "thorn in the flesh" was. There are certain infirmities and 
sorrows which cannot be put into words. Superficial people fetch out 
their skeletons on every possible occasion. Real griefs are sacred and 
silent. The rivulet ceases to babble when it joins the sea. There is 
the silence of self-respect; one does not wish to compromise his per- 



C8e 'SDSotn in tit ifle^jft 



sonal dignity by spreading one's private aifairs. There is the silence 
of affection; for we suffer keenly for the faults of loved ones, but they 
are sacred to our lips. There is the silence of surprise and dismay, when 
we are suddenly struck dumb by disaster, and there is the silence of 
necessity when the thorn pierces too deep for words. There are things 
which are left for exclusive communion between God and the indi- 
vidual soul. 

St. Paul's trouble was incurable. There are people who seem 
proud of the magnitude of their ailments and talk about them on 
every occasion. St. Paul shows nothing of this morbid temperament. 
Thrice he had prayed for its removal, and then he. knew that it had 
come to stay. Most troubles are softened by the healing hand of 
time. On Mt. Vesuvius, some years after an eruption, a moss which 
is known as Lichen Vesuvianum, forms on the scoriated lava, and 
shows the return of life and vegetation. So months and years 
gradually soften sorrows and bring renewed life. And yet there are 
certain things that are incurable. The incurable ward of a hospital 
has a pathos and a sadness all its own. What a different thing life 
is when hope is taken out of it. It is then but a waiting for the end. 

I know that there are many trials in life of which we do not see 
the purpose. But let this comfort us even in the darkest hours, that 
God over-rules the wrath of men and devils to the advantage of His 
people. It is beautiful, in this connection, to hear Paul arguing with 
him.self as to the purpose of his infirmity. He recognizes that he 
has labored more abundantly than all the other apostles and he 
thinks that he might have become "exalted above measure" had it 
not been for his infirmity which showed him his own weakness. 
Later on he also saw that herein lay his strength. "When I am weak 
then am I strong." When he felt his own weakness, then he went 
to the Master for help and strength. 

The "thorn in the flesh" meant his greater service. Most men 
become greater through their infirmities and sorrows. We find that 
the most effective teachers of higher truth, have, almost without ex- 
ception, come through personal suffering, and have thus become 
greater painters, mightier poets, nobler preachers. Read the letters 
of St. Paul and you find that he is a supreme reasoner. You find 
logical argument, but you also find that tender sympathy which shows 
that he also had com.e into the brotherhood of suffering. That beau- 
tiful flower "hearts-ease" grows all over the epistles of St. Paul. 

Wherein do we glory? In our homes, our families, our friends, 
our strength, our wisdom, our wealth, but not in our infirmities. 
Infirmities of body we strive to hide, and misfortunes we conceal and 
sorrows we shun. Yet these are the things which are making men and 
women of us. They are making us strong in spirit, tender and sym- 
pathetic towards others, helpful in adversity and joyful in the hour of 
affliction. Let us also glory in our infirmities, for the jewel must be 
cut to show its luster, and gold must be tried in the fire, and men 
and women in the furnace of affliction, before they are fit for the 
Master's crown. 



^eeli'Ctme anU l^arbest 



Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap. — Gal. vi: 7. 



ffi 



AN has ever been encouraged in his sowing by the certainty 
of reaping. The hope of to-morrow's sheaves supports to- 
day's toilsome sowing. Even so, certainty of victory has 
often won battles before they were fought. Armed with 
confidence patriots have beaten down stone walls with naked fists. 

Uncertainty takes the energy out of the thought and the nerve out 
of the arm. The rumor of some calamity is enough to destroy enter- 
prise. Men will not plow if war-horses are to trample down the ripe 
grain. Men will not build if the enemy are to warm their hands over 
the blazing rafters. Men will not plant vines if others are to wrest 
away their fruits. Men needs hope and a basis of certainty. Therefore 
the Divine promise: "Give and it shall be given unto you." 

Let the husbandm.an give seed to the furrov/s, and soon the fur- 
rows will give back big bundles into the sowers' arms. Give labor 
to the vines, and they will give back rich purple clusters. Give spar- 
ingly to nature in seed and labor, and scanty shall be your harvest. 
Give bountifully and bounty shall be given back. 

This is a universal principle. Drag one plank to the stream and 
you have only a narrow and frail bridge across it. Give deep thought 
to steel cables and stone buttresses and you have the great bridge 
which spans the flood and carries thousands of people. Bury your 
one talent, and one talent shall be yours to the end of time. Invest 
your talent for God and humanity, and it shall be doubled in the 
using. Give kindness and hospitality and generosity to your fellow 
men, and "good m.easure, pressed down and shaken together shall 
men give into your bosom." 

We have then mentioned two elements of the principle of sowing 
and reaping, — the element of certainty by which God encourages man 
to put forth his labor; and, the element of proportion between the in- 
vestment and the return. There is a third element which lies on the 
surface of our text. "Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also 
reap." If you sow wheat-seed you will reap wheat; if you sow tare- 
seed you will have a crop of tares; if you plant acorns you do not 
expect an orchard of peach trees. No, God is not mocked. His 
eternal laws hold good throughout the universe, and whatsoever a 
man sows in material or spiritual things he shall reap that and not 
something else. 

Every day men are sowing and reaping. We are reaping the 
fruits of past sowings and we are sowing for future harvests. But 
it takes so long to appreciate the principle that we shall reap what 
we sow; that if we sow the wind, we shall reap the whirlwind; if we 
sow to the flesh we shall reap corruption, and if we sow to the spirit 
we shall reap a spiritual harvest. 

Childhood and youth are the springtime of life. In a child, par- 
ents have virgin soil in which to plant for time and eternity. The 
child is open to every imxpression, eager for every new experience, 



^tth'Mixm anti ^atbe^t 



drinks in every word spoken. The child is a mirror which reflects 
every act done before it. You are careful to plant good seed in your 
field. Are you just as careful to plant good emotions in the heart of 
your child? You take great pains to remove weeds and briars from 
your garden. Are you willing to spend the same amount of time 
and labor to remove obnoxious traits from your child's character. 

Let me make a plea for the children in the seed-time of their 
lives. Parents, what are you sowing in the fruitful soil of your chil- 
dren's hearts and minds? Are you treating them with inconsiderate 
harshness? Do not be surprised if you reap the same from them 
when they grow older. Do you neglect all their higher faculties and 
better traits and only feed and clothe them as you would an animal? 
Marvel not if bitter neglect be your portion in later years. Do you 
speak lightly before them of things that are true, things that are 
honest, things that are sacred, and things that are of good report? 
One day they will bring you the fruit of irreverence and dishonesty, 
which is a disgraced life. 

"The child is the father of the man," and how many men are 
spoilt in the making! You study for years how to get the best results 
from your fruit trees and vines, you study the rotation of crops, the 
chemical elements of the soil, the conditions of the climate and what 
seed will bring you the best harvest. How much study do you spend 
on that boy or that girl of yours? And yet there you might reap a 
harvest of joy and love and honest pride, with which a great wheat 
crop would not for a moment compare. 

Were it only the parents who would suffer for the improper train- 
ing of the child, we might think it retributive justice. But society 
suffers, and your child suffers, carrying through life a distorted mind 
and a stunted soul even as some must carry a crooked body. 

"Whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap." We stand 
here face to face with an infallible law. The young man sows his 
"wild oats" and thinks that somehow he is going to escape the har- 
vest. But it will come. From time immemorial we have had to 
reap the result of our deeds and no exception will be made in your 
case. If we had keener sight we might see that many things which 
we call "misfortunes" in our lives and the lives of others, are simply 
the result of the principle that what a man sows, that he reaps. 

For our encouragement let us remember that there are no in- 
stantaneous harvests. All good things that we possess have come to 
us by way of the long path. And as things go up in value the time 
becomes longer between seed-time and harvest. The grain grows and 
ripens in a few weeks, but manhood is a thing so high, culture and 
Christian character are harvests so rich as to ask many years for 
ripening. 

Man by his sowing determines what God shall be to him. Give 
God your heart and He shall give you love tender as that of a mother. 
Give Him the publican's prayer, "God be merciful unto me, the sin- 
ner," and He shall give you mercy as wide as the sea. 



%\tt iFestitoal of 3op 



Let not your heart be troubled; ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's 
house are m3.ny mansions; if it were not so I would have told you, I go to prepare a place 
for you. — John xiv: 12. 

Like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we 
also shall walk in the newness of life. — Horn, vi: 4. 



& 



ASTER is the great joy-festival. On this day the light of 
Heaven floods the dull pages of the world's story. It is 
over-arched with the rainbow of hope and is full of the 
mystery of an open door to a new life. We almost hold 
our breath as we approach the Easter theme. A hush comes over 
our spirits, for are we not to witness again that wondrous resurrec- 
tion miracle? 

Round the world to-day is heard this glad acclaim, "He is risen!" 
It is a trumpetblast of joy in a world of sorrow; it is a proclama- 
tion of life in a world of death. Christ found the grave a black 
dungeon where the soul vanished into nothing; He left it a golden 
door where God and the soul meet in the name of an eternal friend- 
ship. What a burst of light through the gloom of doubt! What a 
response to the soul's inmost questioning and longing to live again! 
It softens the pillow of mourning millions. It makes Paul's declara- 
tion radiant, "To die is gain." 

The whole earth thrills with new life at this time. Spring comes 
back, radiant in sunshine, with cheery winds, unfettered streams and 
flowers embroidering her garments new. And Easter, the great joy- 
festival of the Christian church, comes at this time bringing life to 
dying humanity, radiant hope to dark despair, lining our darkest 
clouds with heaven's glory, and ushering in a new day after life's 
sunset. Dying, Victor Hugo said: "When I go down to my grave 
I can say, I have finished my day's work, but I cannot say, I have 
finished my life. My day's work shall begin again next morning. 
Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart. The nearer 
I approach death, the clearer I hear around me the eternal 
symphonies of the world above me. My work is only beginning. 
My thirst for the infinite proves infinity." 

It was the dawning of a new day in the world's life, that morn- 
ing when the women came out of the city gate toward the tomb where 
Jesus' body had been laid. With woman's ever tender thoughtful- 
ness they are bent upon kindly service to that precious body. Mary 
Magdalene is in the lead. She finds the stone rolled away and the 
tomb empty, and she runs back to the city to tell the disciples that 
the Lord's body has been stolen away. Meanwhile the other women 
come to the tomb. They are startled and awed to find there, not 
the body of Jesus, but a visitor from the Land of Life. "Why seek 
ye the living among the dead?" he says. "He is not here, but is risen. 
Remember how He spake unto you." 

The first appearance of the risen Christ is to Mary Magdalene. 
With slow steps and tear-dimmed eyes she has come back to the 
tomb. Jesus stands by her, but she supposing him to be the gardener 
hardly looks up. "Sir, if thou didst carry Him away, tell me where 



Wbt JFe^tital ot 3o^ 



thou hast laid Hmi and I will take Him away." Then that one word 
came to her ears, her name, in that unmistakable voice, "Mary." 
Quick as a flash came the response, "Oh, my Master!" Jesus said: 
"Go to my brethren and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father 
and your Father, unto my God and your God." And Mary quickly 
departs on her glad errand. 

It seems to us as we follow the story of the resurrection, that 
the Disciples were slow indeed to believe what Jesus had so often 
foretold. But on the tremendous question of the resurrection they 
were satisfied with nothing less than certainty. And when we read, 
"Like as Christ was raised up by the glory of the Father, even so 
we also shall walk in the newness of life;" and when it comes to the 
question of the resurrection of our loved ones and our reunion with 
them, our yearning hearts are satisfied with nothing less than cer- 
tainty. Poetic fancies, gossamer-analogies from sprouting seeds and 
bulbs, intuitions and philosophizings are too shadowy to rear a solid 
faith on. We also demand absolute certainty and there are just two 
truths that can give it. The first one is the actual fact of Christ's 
own resurrection from the death-slumber; the second is His omni- 
potent assurance that all who sleep in Him shall be raised up and be 
where He is forevermore. Those early Christians carved on the 
tombs of the martyrs, "In Jesu Christo obdormivit," "In Jesus Christ he 
fell asleep." "Let not your heart be troubled. In my father's house are 
many mansions; I go to prepare a place for you." These words are the 
soil in which bloom the flowers and immortal hope of Easter day. 

What a wonderful force in men's lives has been the resurrection. 
In the strength of that the disciples forgot their timidity. The fact 
of Easter morning was too great to keep to themselves, so they went 
forth preaching Christ and Him crucified. Not a dead Christ, but 
one who rose again. In the power of the resurrection they braved 
all dangers and won great victories. In that power Peter went joy- 
fully to his own cross and Paul smiled at the keen blade of the 
executioner's axe. To them death was only the opening of the door 
which would admit them to the many mansions and the fuller pres- 
ence of Christ. 

If our hearts are cathedrals of the living Christ then we shall 
know that those who have fallen asleep in Him are not dead but 
living. We shall bless Him who has been their Redeemer and rejoice 
in the life which they are living in a more perfect world, and press 
on joyously toward our own redemption. God did not make man in 
His own image to destroy that image in death, but to bring it from 
life unto life, to perfection. 

He lives! He is risen! Oh, that everything dead might go out 
of our creeds, out of our lives, out of our hearts this day. Why are 
you dreary, O mourner? Why does your hand slack, O worker? 
Why do you fear death, O man? Live new lives of hope and love and 
holiness. May the Easter bells ring out death and sin and fear, ring 
out the darkness of the land, ring in the Christ that is to be. 



Wi})txt is Cl)p IBrotljer? 



'Am I my trother's keeper?" — Gen. iv: 9. 



"^ flfcHi.w^ HOSE early chapters of Genesis still keep their hold on 
m C^\ human life. Indeed it seems as if the difficult questions 
^L J which they bring up before every thinking man had tight- 
^^^ ened it. At least men have come to see, that whatever 
may be the historical value of the record, these chapters hold spiritual 
truths forever applicable to the human race. There are pictures here 
which never fade from our memory and never lose their meaning. 

The garden with its sparkling streams and waving trees; the man 
first alone and then having his life richened and deepened by the 
woman at his side; the catastrophe of disobedience; the closed gate- 
way v/ith the flaming sword; the first children, and then like a thun- 
derbolt, hatred and murder! How that scene has fastened itself in 
men's hearts! One brother lying dead beside the smouldering altar; 
the other brother a wanderer upon the face of the earth with the 
irrevocable deed burning at his soul, answering the accusing voice 
with the disclaimer of responsibility, "Am I my brother's keeper?" 

Very different indeed is this son of Adam from the decent, 
reputable citizen of the modern world from whose lips we can hear 
the same question which Cain uttered. But the words are the same. 
To-day men who should know and should care how it is faring with 
their brother man, refuse to know and refuse to care. 

Turn for a moment to the sixteenth chapter of Luke and read a 
most striking illustration from the lips of the Master Himself. There 
was a rich man who fared sumptuously and a poor miserable beggar 
at his gate who dragged out existence on scraps which were thrown 
to the dogs. That story has often been misapplied and misunder- 
stood. It was not because of his riches that Dives was condemned. 
The point of the parable lies in the words "was laid at his gate." 
Here at his very door was an object of compassion and charity. The 
obligation of help, and the opportunity of using a small portion of 
his wealth in charity, was thrust upon his notice. But the rich man 
rustled past in his purple and fine linen. And when some compas- 
sionate underling called his attention to this case of need at his gate, 
he answers, "Am I that beggar's keeper?" 

From the very spirit of the Gospel of Jesus, and from the very 
constitution of human society, comes the demand that every man 
shall be, so far as he has ability and opportunity, a keeper of his 
brother man. That he has not done his duty unless, while he has 
been developing his own life, he has also been helping others. 

Tell that to some people and it seems to them absolutely absurd. 
They think it right and proper that someone should do it, just as 
someone must dig the mines, and someone must plow the 
fields, but for themselves to aid in the work is absolutely 
out of the question. Go to some men of fashion and wealth 
in our great cities and tell them that only two blocks away 
from their doors there are poverty and misery untold; that there 



mint (0 ^iv i^totitti 



are hundreds of men and women and little children living in unsani- 
tary hovels not fit for cattle; that such conditions are breeders of 
vice and corruption of every sort; that thousands of human bodies 
and souls are going to destruction under their very eyes. They look 
at you in a surprised sort of way and say the responsibility is not 
theirs. "Go to the ministers; go to the public charities; there are 
societies which look after such matters, but it is no affair of ours. 
What have we to do with that riff-raff over in the tenement?" 

We boast ourselves, at the present day, of our benevolences. We 
are proud of the munificent gifts which are made (and advertised) 
to our institutions of mercy. "There are no cripples in our streets," 
we say. And it is indeed a blessed sign of the times that we have 
hospitals and institutions for the care and treatment of every disease 
known to man. But are there no cripples in our streets? What hos- 
pital treats a diseased soul? What physician treats a broken life? 
Our spiritual cripples tar outnumber the others and they fill our 
streets and our homes. O, that we could feel that mental and spiritual 
defects cry to us as loudly as any bodily ailment. O, that we could 
feel that the people who suffer from selfishness and ignorance, from 
ungovernable appetite and a craving for drink, from evil associations 
and a tendency to vice are a thousand times more in need of our help 
than the man who has lost a limb. In the parable to which I referred 
there were two men — the man in the palace and the man at his gate. 
Of the two, the man in the palace was the greater cripple. 

Sometimes when we think how one change would regenerate 
the world, we are buoyed up with hope that the change may come 
soon. That m.en would come to believe that the man who takes upon 
himself none of the responsibility of other lives, is a mean, selfish, 
withered fragment of a man. Helpfulness is in our very natures and 
we cannot disclaim it. "Am I my brother's keeper?" you say, as 
some one points you to a man beside you who is going to ruin, and 
begs you to save him, "Am I my brother's keeper?" and you turn 
away. But as you say it you have an uncomfortable feeling that 
if it is in your power to help that man, the duty is yours. 

No parents can disclaim responsibility for their children. To 
God and man they must answer for the lives given into their keeping. 
No sister or brother can throw off the responsibility which they bear 
for each other. No young man or woman who has a friend, and 
sees that friend losing the purity of life and drifting from good in- 
fluences, but has a solemn responsibility placed upon them. By the 
declaration of God's word and by the very constitution of the universe 
you are your brother's keeper. 

Let us close where we began. It is again the early world outside 
the gate of Eden. Abel lies dead and Cain is fleeing with the terror 
of the deed upon him. And there is a third Presence, and He asks: 
"Where is Abel, thy brother?" What right has He to ask? Every 
right. It is the Father asking for His child. And is not that the 
great final truth about it all, that within the Fatherhood of God we 
are to know and recognize our Brotherhood to one another. 



CI)? Sttngliom Come 



Repent ye, for the kingrdom of God is at hand. — Matth. iv: 17. 

v^^^^ HE earliest preaching of John the Baptist and o£ Jesus 
m C"\ Himself was the preaching of the kingdom. They exhorted 
m. J repentance, because the kingdom of God was at hand. The 
^^^ reason is often forgotten by our modern exhorters, but it 
was distinct when the Saviour spoke and when His apostles spoke. 
Yes! and when they prayed as He taught them to pray, their first 
prayer was for this kingdom of God, "Thy Kingdom Come.*' 

Our ideas of this kingdom of God are generally very hazy. But 
what Christ taught His disciples and what they believed was that 
this kingdom was to come in this world in which they lived. And 
when the Christian church in its simpler moments falls back on the 
foundation truths, this is what it teaches now, that God can reign 
and is to reign in this world. All things bad, mean, cruel, painful, 
unjust, unclean, untrue shall cease to be. God shall reign. His king- 
dom shall come. Just as in the heavens above planets move accord- 
ing to His law, so the time shall come in this world of man that 
everything shall obey His purpose. Why not? Man is His child and 
made in His image. Some day man shall come into a fuller like- 
ness to his Father, and then God's kingdom has come. 

The apostles were sent out to proclaim glad tidings. What were 
these glad tidings, what was their Gospel? Simply this that God is to 
reign in the world and that His kingdom is coming soon. In their 
eagerness they thought that the perfect reign of God was to come 
sooner than the hard facts proved. It has taken longer to overrule 
and turn back the forces of evil than they expected. But I do not 
think it a misfortune that a preacher of good tidings should be 
sanguine. Better put God's kingdom a little too early than put it 
off indefinitely far. So Paul and the rest preached that it was com- 
ing as a man might tell you that next Christmas is coming. 

Into the public square of some Greek town would come running 
a messenger to call the men lounging there: "Come here; a man is 
proclaiming good news, glad tidings." "Good news! What is this 
good news?" What did they hear when they came there? They 
heard that God was going to reign and that right soon. Men who 
came from homes where children were sick and in agony of pain 
heard that God was to reign, that sickness was to be done away and 
health to be the law. Slaves who were certain of nothing but stripes 
heard that God was to reign and every child of God to be free. 
Men who lived by bitter alms heard that God was to reign, and 
that every child of God was to have his home and be protected in 
it. And this weeping mother and her silent husband, as they stop 
to hear the preacher while they are carrying to its resting place the 
urn which contains all that is left of the body of their child — they 
hear that God is to reign, that there is no death; that the body is 
only an outside shell which has fallen off; that their little girl is 
immortal. Oh, it was clear enough in those days of eager preach- 
ing what the good tidings were. 



'aCli? Hingtiom €omt 



Now let us try the tree by its fruits. These men said that the 
kingdom of God was coming. Was it coming? or were they mis- 
taken? Does God reign to-day in any realm where the devil seemed 
to reign then? The Master did great things, but He said of those who 
came after Him: "Greater things than these shall ye do." Suppose 
St. Paul had been gifted with the spirit of prophesy as he stood on 
Areopagus in Athens. He would have said: "I tell you that diseases 
of which your children are dying shall be trampled out. I tell you 
that leprosy which is everywhere apparent shall be unknown among 
Christians. Plague and black-death shall cease and be studied only 
as matters of history. I tell you that the average human life shall 
be three times what it is to-day. I tell you that God shall forbid pain 
in surgery; that beneath the surgeon's knife the patient shall sleep 
serene. I tell you also that God means that the word "slavery" 
shall be a word without a meaning in this world. God also means 
to put an end to starvation and want, He means that there shall be 
nations of men who need not know what the word "hunger" means. 
I tell you that God is to reign in such nations in happy homes, in 
which no child ever feels an angry blow; in which the peasant as 
well as the prince may have all things that make life blessed and 
happy. I tell you that from ocean to ocean every man because he is 
a man shall have every privilege whatever his language, color or 
worship. Yes! and Jesus Christ shall so reign over the world, that 
the nations v/hich bear His name however unworthily shall be recog- 
nized as of paramount power." 

If any one had said that in Ephesus or Corinth or Athens, the 
cultivated Greeks v/ould have left their seats long before the man 
was done raving. Yet a thousand times more than this— as you 
know — is already true. And it is true because Jesus Christ sent 
those men to preach glad tidings, and the tidings were the reign of 
God in the world of God's children. 

Now, do not think that I have been describing the kingdom of 
God. I have mentioned only some of the preliminary steps in its 
coming. And here is the great purpose of the Church of Christ in 
the world — to make ready the pathway in order that He may reign 
whose right it is to reign. 

But what of that exhortation, "Repent ye!" What has that to 
do with the coming of the kingdom? Isn't there something in your life 
which is hindering the coming of the kingdom to the children in 
your home, to wife or husband, to the neighborhood in which you 
live, to the church of which you are a member? Yes, you know 
there is. That is the thing to repent of. It is fearful to think out 
of how many hearts and homes people are keeping the kingdom — with 
its peace and joy and blessing. 

If you mean the prayer, "Thy Kingdom Come," act up to it, 
work in that spirit. 

"And for this pray we 
May Thy Kingdom's peace 
Come unto us; for we. unless it come 
With all our striving, thither tend in vain." 



%))t lvalue of i^eroic 2)eeD0 

other men labored and ye are entered into their lahor. — John iv: 38. 

Who through faith, subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, 
stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, 
out of weakness were made strong, waxed mighty in war, turned to flight the armies of 
aliens.— Heb. xi: 33-34. 

^'^■^^ HIS is the epitaph of the earth's great hearts, the life-story 
M C^\ of men who have struggled for man's freedom and progress. 
^L J The eleventh chapter of Hebrews is the catalogue of 
^^^^ heroes of the faith, who believed in the universal father- 
hood of God and the consequent brotherhood of man. These were the 
patriots and martyrs who won our first battles for liberty and handed 
down the inheritance of nobleness to their children. They suffered 
untold tortures. They were bound and imprisoned; they were stoned 
and slain with the sword; they were exiled and wandered destitute in 
the wilderness, in mountains and caves of the earth; "of whom the 
world was not worthy." The institutions most excellent in our day 
represent the principles for which these martyrs died, and dying, con- 
quered. They were the first to face earth's despots. They wove the 
first threads of the flag of liberty, and made it indeed the banner of 
the morning, for they dyed it crimson in their hearts' blood. 

It was not given unto these heroes to enter into the fruits of 
their labors. With a few exceptions their names are unknown and 
their histories unwritten; but let us who have entered into their 
labors, thank God for the lives of men in all ages who have set their 
shoulders to every form of evil and injustice that we might live in 
freedom and peace. 

Human life is like the grain of wheat of which Christ spoke: 
"Except it fall in the ground and die it abideth alone, but if it die it 
bringeth forth much fruit." All our most valued social and religious 
possessions are built on the lives of men and watered with their blood. 
The principle is that nothing is gained without vicarious suffering. 
Even as the coral polypes build their minute bodies into the reefs and 
coral islands of the Pacific, so good men of all ages have built their 
lives into the social structure, until it has risen above the surf of 
ignorance, prejudice and slavery. The consecrated blood of yester- 
day is the social and spiritual capital of to-day. The civil, intellec- 
tual and religious freedom of our age are the outcome of the moral 
courage and heroism of the past. 

Do not think that freedom was born when the first gun was fired 
in its cause. When Abraham left Ur of the Chaldees, lifting his face 
to heaven in the worship of the One God, he announced to the world 
freedom of conscience, and became the spiritual ancestor of our own 
Pilgrim Fathers. For the freedom of mankind is a temple. There 
are great stones in the foundation laid by these early men of oak and 
iron. Later generations added now and then a stone for increase of 
height, or a turret for increase of beauty. And the temple stands incom-^ 
plete, for there is still much of injustice and tyranny under the sun. 

The principle of victorious sacrifice runs all through history. 
Jesus of Nazareth declared it a law of God and suffered on Calvary 



Wbt mint ot ^etoit 2Deeti0 



in order to save. The mother spends her strength and often gives 
her life for the child; so good men give and spend themselves for 
some cause or country. To-day we enjoy liberty of thought and 
speech, but some four thousand battles have been fought to obtain 
it, blood has flowed like rivers and tears have fallen like rain. To-day 
the serf has entered into citizenship and the slave into freedom, 
but it has been over trenches filled with the bodies of patriots and 
heroes. To-day our children are falling heirs to this rich land with 
all its treasures, material and mental. But with the lives of our 
ancestors and parents were these treasures purchased. Our fathers 
subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, escaped the arrows of 
savages, subdued forests, drained swamps, planted vineyards, builded 
schools and churches and colleges. They dwelt in cabins, wandered 
about exploring rivers and forests and mines, were often destitute and 
tormented because of their love of liberty, and for the slave's sake 
were slain with the sword. 

How seldom earth's great heroes enter into the fruits of their 
labors. Moses spends his life in freeing his people from the bondage 
of Pharaoh and leading them through the wilderness. He is allowed 
to look across Jordan into the promised land, but he never sets foot 
there. So it has ever been. So it was with Washington and Lincoln. 

Once the representatives of five great nations came together to 
destroy the slave trade of Africa. They met because one day West- 
minster Abbey was crowded with great men of England and in their 
midst stood two black men who had brought the body of Livingstone 
from the jungles of Africa. Faithful Susi told how, worn thin by 
African fever, Livingstone had decided to make one last effort to 
locate the lairs of the slave dealers. Unattended by any save his faith- 
ful black men, he was overcome in the jungle, and with his dying 
hand wrote his message to the world: "God bless any man who 
will help to heal this open sore of the world." During the ten years 
afterward Africa made greater advancement than during ten cen- 
turies before, and we know it was through the suffering and death 
of David Livingstone. 

The historian Curtis says that there are three American orations 
which will live in history: That of Patrick Henry at Williams- 
burg, that of Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg, and that of Wendell 
Phillips at Faneuil Hall. A thousand martyrs to liberty lent eloquence 
to Henry's tongue, the hills of Gettysburg exhaled memories of 
our great struggle for the freedom of all men and anointed the lips 
of Lincoln, while many martyrs to the same cause poured their 
spirits over Wendell Phillips' nature and gave him the speech divine. 

And what shall we say more, but that all that we possess of 
life and liberty and honor and influence, has been bought by the 
lives and hearts' blood of men. These men have labored and we 
have entered into their labors. Let us therefore honor their 
memories and commemorate the deeds which they wrought. 

May God bless our land and all men who strive for its Christian 
honor and upbuilding. 



Unto me who am less than the least of all the saints, is this grace given that I should 
preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ. — Eph. iii: 8. 

'•^ -^OHN RICHARD GREEN, the English historian, directed 

j^ ■ that on his tombstone should be carved the words "He 
m^ M# died learning." All those who have acquired the greatest 
^^-^^ amount of human knowledge have felt that they were 
only beginners, and that the longest life was too brief for all but 
the rudiments of the knowledge which the world possesses. New- 
ton considered himself a child playing on the seashore. "Now and 
then I pick up a prettier shell or a smoother pebble, but the great 
ocean of truth lies undiscovered before me." Somewhat similar was 
St. Paul's attitude to Christ. It was not that he could not know 
Him, for he says: "I know whom I have believed," but he could 
not know Him fully. Well may we also ponder on and marvel at 
the "unsearchable riches of Christ." He is the Christ of all ages; 
even more fully of the twentieth century than of the first. He is the 
Christ of all nations; yea, more of the Gentile than of the Jew. He 
is the Christ of all conditions; perhaps more of the poor than of the 
rich. If a photographing telescope is turned on the Milky Way, 
after three hours exposure, hundreds of stars have appeared on the 
sensitive plate. After six hours exposure 30,000 stars are photo- 
graphed; and after 24 hours exposure 300,000. So when we turn the 
telescope of the mind on Christ we are overwhelmed and can only 
exclaim with St. Paul: "O, the unsearchable riches of Christ!" 

Consider the unsearchable riches of His teachings. The temple 
officer gave testimony — "Never man spake as this man." A few years 
ago Congress issued the Thomas Jefferson Bible. Jefferson wished to 
eliminate all the supernatural elements. His gospel ends with the 
words: "There they laid Jesus and rolled a great stone to the 
door of the sepulchre and departed." But our gospels do not end 
that way. There is no stone against the door. Our Christ is a 
living, active Christ whose teaching is fuller of meaning and power 
to-day than ever before. The ages have not outgrown it, nor 
adjusted it to suit the times, but we are still striving to live up to 
some of our Master's simplest precepts. 

Behind the teaching is a marvellous life, a character of unsearch- 
able riches. The Bible is a book of biographies. When we write 
biographies we ignore or touch lightly on the faults of our heroes. 
Not so the Bible. Moses, David, Hezekiah, Peter, James, John, have 
the X-rays turned on them and their lives are laid bare. Good and 
evil are chronicled with divine impartiality. One life passes before 
us in unassailable purity; one character is without blemish — that of 
Jesus of Nazareth. We know about the sins of His contemporaries. 
Caesar said of Herod: "It is better to be Herod's dog than Herod's 
son." We know the sins of Caesar, of Anthony and Cleopatra, of 
Alexander, and we would know the faults of Christ had there been 
any to record. He alone could utter the great challenge to His 
enemies, "Which of you convinceth me of sin?" 



CStisft in %iit and 'STSougSt 



And what a negative picture this is. I have said nothing about 
the tenderness of Jesus, how He gathered little children into His 
arms. Nor about the sympathy of Jesus; how He stopped the funeral 
procession at Nain and raised up the widow's son. Nor of the cour- 
age of Jesus, how He denounced the hypocritical pharisees. Nor of 
the compassion of Jesus, how He healed all manner of sick people. 
Nor of the love of Jesus, how He spent His last ounce of strength 
and His last drop of blood to redeem a fallen world. Nor of the 
mercy of Jesus, how He prayed for His crucifiers "Father forgive 
them for they know not what they do." I have only glanced at the 
glories of Jesus* character. Its full riches are unsearchable. When 
we read over the simple scripture narratives we find our hearts un- 
folding to Him as flowers to the sun, and say with George Matheson: 

"0 love that will not let me go, 
I rest my weary soul in Thee. 
I give Thee back the life I owe, 
That in Thy ocean depths its flow 
May fuller, richer he." 

The influence of Jesus has been the gulf stream of history, bring- 
ing new life and beauty and fruitage to low and degraded people. 
It seemed the dream of an enthusiast for Jesus with His little group 
of followers about Him to say: "If I be lifted up, I will draw all 
men unto Me." But after only 50 generations He has a third of 
a billion of followers and they rule the nations of the earth. In the 
life time of some of you who read these words practically the whole 
earth will have accepted Christ. 

I should leave unstated the most important truth of all, if I did 
not remind you that the secret of all the achievements of Christ in 
the world has been His marvellous influence on the individual heart. 
It is because He wins the hearts of men of power and might such as 
Paul and Savonarola and Luther and Stanley and Gladstone, because 
He fills the hearts of heroes with His love that Jesus is conquering 
the world. Some sneer at missionary effort and call it an idle dream, 
but out of such dream stuff we are building Christian empires in the 
East and under the Southern Cross. One who was martyred in the 
Boxer rebellion in China wrote to his wife who was in America with 
their little boy: "I want you to take our little boy and send him to 
college and send him to this very place where they are about to slay 
me, to preach to these poor people the unsearchable riches of Christ." 

Such men as that Christ is producing all over the world, and 
such men are building an imperishable kingdom. Empires have been 
founded by force. Jesus alone has founded His empire upon love, 
and to-day thousands would willingly lay down their lives for His 
cause. If we have not accepted Him as our Lord before, shall we 
not willingly put our hand in His hand — the hand that was pierced 
for us, and say: 

"I loved Thee late; too late I loved Thee, Lord, 
Yet not so late, but Thou dost still afford 
The proof that Thou wilt bear, with winning art 
One sinner more upon thy loving heart. 
And may I prove, when all of life is nast, 
Tho late I loved, I loved thee to the last," 



%\ft t)ilter Jlintng 



Men see not the bright light which is in the cloud. — Job xxzvii: 21. 

XN these words Elihu states a great truth which is just as 
evident now as it was when the ancient book of Job was 
written. Most men are born grumblers. They are con- 
tinually complaining of what they have not, forgetting the 
10,000 blessings wherewith God is crowning their lives in the 
occasional shadow of a passing cloud. 

The case of Job was a very exceptional case. He had lost prop- 
erty and family and health at one stroke. His affliction seems to cover 
the whole sky of his life, and yet he is told to look for "the bright 
light which is in the cloud." With the majority of us God's bless- 
ings outnumber as one to 10,000 the troubles and sorrows of our lives, 
and unto trustful faith which believes in the goodness of a Heavenly 
Father, and even unto true philosophy the darkest things of life have 
a meaning and mission of love. But we do not look for it. Nay, we 
do worse. Even when the cloud has a "silver lining" we turn our 
eyes ungratefully away from its beauty to its darkness. 

Here is a man whose business does not prosper. He is honest, in- 
dustrious and frugal, and yet he is compelled to live on small means 
and to deny himself most luxuries. This is his "cloud." But he has 
health and strength, and at his table and fireside sits an affectionate 
family, happy in mutual love and helpfulness. How small is his cloud 
in comparison with the great blessing which God has bestowed! 

Bereavement is a cloud which brings terror and darkness to many 
a life. The death of a mother, the death of a loved child, the death 
of a young man in the strength and promise of his manhood. These 
are dark clouds indeed. But in these clouds there is the brightest 
light that ever shone upon the earth, the light of God's promise of 
a deathless life, the light of God's endless tove, and the light of hope 
that human love shall also continue beyond the grave. But some- 
times "we see not the bright light which is in the cloud," and yet there 
is nothing from which I, in my ministry, have seen greater blessings 
flow than from the visitation of death in some households. The Angel 
of Death is often the Angel of Salvation. 

Perhaps the darkest cloud which overshadows a human life is that 
of bodily suffering and continued dependence upon the charity of 
others. And yet there is a bright light in that cloud. Some of the 
most beautiful characters which the world has possessed have been 
forged in the furnace of bodily affliction. 

Let every person who thinks that Providence has been unkind, 
read Ian Maclaren's story of "Marjorie." Marjorie had been blind 
from birth and from youth had been paralyzed. She had never known 
father or mother; never seen the primroses in Tochty woods when 
spring made her first visit, nor the purple heather in autumn 
time, nor the golden corn in the field before her door. She 
had no kinsfolk to take charge of her, so the Glen adopted 



^it &ilbet: Emms: 



Marjorie, and declared in many a wayside talk and kirkyard 
conference that she had given them more than they had ever given 
to her. Marjorie saw the hand of an all-wise and all-loving Provi- 
dence in everything which concerned her. As for her darkness of 
earthly sight, this, she insisted, was the chief good which God had 
bestowed upon her, and she made out her case with the ingenuity of a 
faithful and contented heart. "If I dinna see, there's nobody in the 
Glen can hear like me. There's no a footstep of a Drumtochty man 
comes to the door but I ken his name, and there's no a voice out on 
the road that I canna tell. The birds sing sweeter to me than to 
anybody else, and I can hear them cheeping to one another in the 
bushes before they go to sleep. And the flowers smell sweeter to 
me, the roses and the carnations and the bonny moss rose — and I 
judge that the oatcake and milk taste richer because I dinna see them. 
Na, na, ye're no to think that I have been ill-treated by my God, for 
if He didna give me ae thing, He gave me many things instead." 

One day she confided to her elder, Donald Menzies: "There's a 
mercy waiting for me that'll crown a' His goodness, and I am feared 
when I think o' it, for I am no worthy." 

"What is that you will be meaning, Marjorie?" said the elder. 

"He has covered my face with His hand as a father plays with 
his bairn, but some day soon He will lift His hand, and the first thing 
Marjorie sees in a' her life will be His own face." 

Oh that we could all recognize the ministry of sorrow and 
trouble. If we only understood, we should, like Marjorie count it 
our chief blessing. The silver lining is broad and bright in every 
cloud. What leader of men has worn soft raiment? What Luther 
or a Lincoln was reared in kings' palaces? It is wresting against the 
wind that works toughness into trees and strength into men. Supreme 
manhood is raw human nature plus the troubles and temptations and 
difficulties that chisel out character. Wine comes from the crushing 
of the grapes, and joy is a fine spirit distilled often from bruised hopes 
and affections. 

I think the time has come for the Christian church to teach all 
its people that abiding happiness is not simply a possibility but a 
duty; that worry is a poison, not a medicine; that fretful people lower 
the level of life and breed disaster; that even over the evil of the 
world we need not fret ourselves, for "though the earth be removed 
and the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea" we need not 
fear, "for God is in His heaven, and all is well with His world." 

The Gospel of optimism and the Gospel of joy is the Gospel of 
Jesus. The great promise is that "all things" — and there is no excep- 
tion to that — "all things shall work together for good to them that 
love God." 

"The inner side of every cloud 
Is bright and shining; 
I therefore turn my clouds ahout 
And always wear them inside out, 
To show the liningr." 



Clje fact of Cljrigt 



For God who commanded the li^ht to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our 
hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus 
Christ. — II Cor. iv; 6. 

^^^^^^ HE face of Jesus of Nazareth must have been a striking face. 
M C^ People never mistook any of His disciples for Christ. His 
^L J was a face to remember. One that came up in one's mem- 
^^^^ ory in quiet and contemplative hours. 

I do not think that any one who had seen the face of Christ 
ever forgot it. His friends certainly did not. People who had looked 
into His countenance while He did some miracle, never forget it. 
And people who had been the objects of His miraculous touch surely 
never forgot the look of love and pity on His face. Simon, who 
walked by Jesus' side within the cordon of Roman soldiery, and bore 
His cross for Him awhile on the way to Calvary, surely never forgot 
the look of His face. Caiaphas, the high priest, who had plotted 
against Christ and at last succeeded in having Him brought in for 
trial, never forgot it. Pilate, who had sent many men to the cross 
without compunction, but never one like this Jesus, and who in his 
cowardly way tried to set Him free, never forgot it. The centurion 
who sat immovable on his horse and looked up at Jesus through 
the long hours of the crucifixion, never forgot it. 

What did they see, these friends and foes of Christ? And what 
do you see as you look into the face of Jesus of Nazareth? 

The face is an index of the mind. It is a dial which records 
traits of character and emotions of the soul. Experiences of life 
write themselves upon the countenance in unmistakable characters. 
Those who deal much with mankind in its moral nature learn to read 
faces with astonishing accuracy. How wonderfully the expression of 
the face changes with the change of life. When we find transformed 
lives, we also find transformed faces. 

If the face is the dial of the soul, then what of the face of Christ? 
It was a face that drew people with the wonder of it. It was a face 
that defied description, for no authentic record describes it, and you 
feel that no artist's brush has done it justice. As His was the purest 
soul, so His was the perfect face. His last years, it was, no doubt, 
marked with the furrows of compassion, sorrow and suffering, and 
yet I believe it to have been in form and feature and fashion the most 
perfect face that the world has ever seen. The apostle looking into 
the face of Christ can find no words to describe it, can find no human 
parallel and simply exclaims "It is the glory of God!" 

The Psalmist of old looking up to the sky on a clear starry nighi. 
exclaimed: "The heavens declare the glory of God!" When we look 
out upon the world bathed in sunshine on a beautiful spring morning 
or when we look over fields ripe for the reaper, or when we look over 
mountain and hill, valley and stream, and all the changing aspects of 
a beautiful landscape, we exclaim: "The earth declares the glory of 
God!" But the most glorious thing in the universe is the mind and 
soul of man, capable of love and truth and honor and the highest 
emotions. When, therefore, the perfect mind and the purest soul 



^8e iface Dt €W&t 



dwelt upon the earth people saw "the glory of God in the face of 
Jesus Christ." 

As you turn your eyes on the face of Jesus what do you see? We 
have imagined to ourselves Christ's appearance, and we have seen 
pictures to represent Him by different artists, though none of them 
quite satisfy us. Hoffman's picture of Christ in the temple comes 
nearer to satisfying me than any other I have seen. But let us turn 
our eyes on Christ Himself, and what do we see? 

The first scene is Bethlehem, and we are looking into the face of a 
little Child. It is a beautiful face and there is probably an unusual 
look of gravity upon it. One would say that a great destiny lay be- 
fore that Child. And in that Child's face we see the fulfillment of 
God's promises of a Savior, and in spite of the lowly surroundings 
men come and pay homage to this Child as to a prince, for the star of 
empire flames upon His brow. 

The next scene is at the Jordan. John is baptizing and Jesus 
comes for baptism. The young Christ steps out of the water conse- 
crated to His work, and as you look into His face you see there the 
holy purpose of His ministry. You see there the steadfastness of 
character which no persecution nor temptation could swerve from 
His purpose. It is Christ at the beginning of His ministry looking 
out upon the world which He is to conquer and save. 

It is a year later. He is surrounded by a great multitude. They 
listen eagerly to His parables and words of wisdom. And then He 
heals their sick with a touch or a word. Then he feeds them all, for 
they have been with Him all day. Shoulder your way through the 
crowd so you can look into His face, and what do you see? Purity 
of heaven in a world of sin; wonderful sympathy which feels with 
every ailment of body and soul; benevolence which would supply all 
wants; infinite love which embraces all mankind. 

Almost two years pass and Jesus is again surrounded by a multi- 
tude. This time it seems to be a procession and is passing from the 
judgment hall of Pilate out to Calvary. If you can get through the 
iron wall of Roman soldiery and look into His face you will see there 
graven deep lines of suffering. You see evidences of heart-grief, and 
you see there written the record of the days and the nights which 
Jesus had spent in sorrow and prayer for the people who were sending 
Him to the cross. But you see also the holy determination and peace 
of one who is making a great sacrifice. 

It is a few weeks later and we are at Bethany. There is Jesus 
with His disciples. But we can scarcely look into His face for the 
glory of it. It is shining like the sun. There is victory and triumph, 
for the great battle has been won; there is joy, for the great work 
is done and atonement has been made for the sins of men. The light 
of heaven surrounds him, for he is going back to His Father's house. 
There are many things which you may see in the face of Christ 
which I have not mentioned. But is it any wonder that men when 
they gazed upon His face were lost in wonder and exclaimed: "It 
is the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." 



^nxxv anD l^apptnes^s 



He that believeth shall not make haste. — Isaiah xxviii: 16. 

"•w ^ URRY is the enemy of happiness. Granting that the world 

^^^^ is happier than ever it was before, let us also affirm that 
I p we are imperiling that happiness by cultivating the habit 
^ ^^ of being everlastingly busy. Our work is forever with us. 
Men have forgotten that they need leisure to grow and ripen. The 
careers of multitudes of men and women are described in Carlyle*s 
words regarding great men — "They seem like ships blazing off shore, 
for the delectation of the people assembled on the beach." 

Hurry is an American sin. We are the people who never have 
time. The very noise and din of life has so long compelled us to 
look around that we are in danger of entirely forgetting to look up. 
Even the nighttime is crowded. The glare of the lamp has destroyed 
the solemnity of midnight and put out the stars. 

Partly our hurry and worry may be a thing of blood and tem- 
perament. If the German is deliberate, slow in his movements, 
ponderous and a lover of detail; if the Englishman is naturally con- 
servative, cautious in changing his plans and arriving at new decisions 
— the American is swift in his intellectual processes, quick in his 
steps, and acts with instant and decisive energy. We have coined a 
new word to describe that which has become a national trait, a word 
that fits us as the glove fits the hand — the word "hustle." 

We can understand to some extent how this active, energetic, 
nervous quality came to be a national characteristic. Our fathers 
found this new continent a wilderness. Everything was to be done — 
roads to be hewn out of the forests, quarries to be uncovered, mines 
to be opened up, fields to be subdued, orchards to be planted, farm 
houses, factories, towns and cities to be builded. Rising up early and 
sitting up late they gave themselves with untiring diligence to their 
task. If work and hurry was the gristle of our fathers, it has become 
the very bone and tissue of their sons. 

But there is no greatness and little happiness without leisure. 
Mountains can be thrown up in a day because the stones are dead 
and need no growth. But character is a growth. Like all living 
things it enlarges slowly. It cannot be hurried. There is no hot- 
house method of developing a beautiful disposition. Time alone will 
do the work. Give the violet time and it will secrete its exquisite per- 
fume. Give the vine time and it will put a soft bloom on its purple 
clusters. Give the child time for exercise and sleep and there will be 
a rosy bloom on its cheek. Give the intellect time and it will take on 
a certain refinement and culture. 

Hurry often destroys the very object which it wishes to attain. 
Christ was a carpenter's apprentice for many years. He knew that 
the world was waiting and dying for His redemption. A soul was 
passing into eternity every second, and He was aware of it; and yet 
He went on making plows and yokes. He learnt His lessons line by 



I^utrp anti ^amnt0& 



line, precept by precept and in the fullness of time, when well pre- 
pared. He entered upon His great work. Biographers tell us that 
during the first 30 years of his life, Abraham Lincoln's library con- 
sisted of a single score of books. But that poor youth, dwelling apart 
from men, reflected so long over these great authors that at last their 
thoughts entered into the very structure of his mind, as iron enters 
into the blood of the physical system. Alone he sailed the seas of 
thought with God for his sole companion. At last he stood forth a 
teacher, a leader, a mountain-minded man, a statesman, a voice for all 
that was deepest and divinest in the heart of the common people. 

There is no royal road to greatness. Leaf by leaf the great oak 
is builded. Thought by thought and prayer by prayer the soul 
assembles habits, expands and grows strong. Forty years in the 
desert for Moses, 50 years in the hills for the father of astronomy, 
30 years at the carpenter's bench for Jesus before He undertakes His 
great mission. Homer, the father of poetry, is blind and finds his song 
in silence and solitude. Paul lives three years in Arabia before he 
begins his work as a world-wide teacher and reformer. 

The haste of modern life is the waste of all the best that is within 
men. The happiness that is just within reach is passed by, and instead 
we choose worry, hurry and misery. It was a wise word of the 
prophet when he said: "He that believeth shall not make haste," for 
hurry and worry are too often the evidences of lack of faith in God 
our Father. 

Peace and Patience lie at the basis of true happiness. Take down 
your Bible and read the words of wisdom and the promises which 
strive to speak peace to the turmoil of our living. "Better a dinner of 
herbs with contentment, than a feast gained by worry," said a wise 
man of old. V/e are told that all things shall work together for good 
to them that love God, and why should a man of faith worry. "Be 
not over-anxious for the morrow, what ye shall eat or what ye shall 
drink, or what ye shall put on, for your Father knoweth that ye have 
need of these things," said Jesus. "Cast all your care upon God, for 
He careth for you." In our worry and fret would that some voice 
could call us back to the lost Eden of peace where God walks and 
talks with us in the cool of the day. 

I know a lad who planted flowering peas beside his mother's door 
hoping that the vines would creep over it. But in his impatience 
he dug up the seeds to see if they were sprouting. We are all doing 
things as silly in our larger tasks, and thus destroying our present 
peace and our future happiness. It is ours to plant the seed; it is 
God's to give the increase. 

"If solid happiness we prize 
Within our breasts this jewel lies, 
And they are fools who roam. 
The world has nothing to bestow; 
From our own selves our joys must flow, 
And that dear hut our home." 



3le0ufl; ^asi&ins ^V 



They told him that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by. — Luke xviii: 37. 

XN the history of a Jewish battle we are told how an officer 
took an important prisoner and gave him in charge of a 
soldier saying: "Keep this man with the utmost vigilance, 
for upon his person hang the issues of the battle." Then 
the officer turned and plunged again into the thick of the fight. But 
the soldier became negligent. Startled by a noise, he jumped to his 
feet in time to see his prisoner leap into the thicket. To his com- 
mander the terror-stricken soldier had no excuse to give save this: 
"While thy servant was busy here and there, the man was gone." Gone 
opportunity! And the lightning could not equal it in its flight. Gone 
honor, fidelity, good name, irretrievably lost! For Infinity Himself 
cannot reverse the wheel of events and bring back lost opportunities. 

Everything has its season and opportune time. Fields offer an 
opportune time to the husbandman. In February the hard soil re- 
fuses the plow; the sun refuses its heat, the sky rain, the seed refuses 
growth. In May all forces conspire towards the harvest. Then must 
the sower go forth and sow, for nature decrees that he who neglects 
seed time will starve in winter. 

Nature is full of these strategic times. Years ago our nation sent 
astronomers to Africa to witness the transit of Venus. A ship was 
fitted out, instruments packed and all was made ready for the time 
when the sun and Venus and the earth should be in line. Each 
astronomer knew that his eye must be at the small end of the tele- 
scope when the planet went scudding by the large end. Once the 
period of conjunction had passed no machinery could turn the planet 
back on her axis. 

So with all men, blindness to the opportunity is failure. Inven- 
tions may be defined as great minds detecting the opportunity in 
nature; Galileo finding the lens in the ox's eye; Watt seeing steam 
lift an iron lid. Opportunities come to thousands who never seize 
them. Their only excuse is, "While thy servant was busy here and 
there it was gone." 

But this is the story of a man who had one opportunity in his 
life and seized it. Bartimaeus was a blind man who sat by the city 
gate of Jericho. Years he had spent in darkness, living on the scanty 
alms of the wayfarer. Perhaps some rumor had reached him of Jesus 
of Nazareth and the wonderful things He did, and possibly he had 
often wondered whether that miracle worker could restore his sight. 
One day he heard a great commotion on the road and many people 
passing through the gate. He asked what it meant. "They told him 
that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by." Then he cried out with all his 
might: "Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me." Those who 
stood near rebuked him, but he heeded them not. It was the one op- 
portunity of his life and he could not let it pass. "Jesus have mercy!" 
and the Master heard him. 



ge0tt0 l^a00mg B? 



If Bartimaeus had let Jesus go by without notice, or if the re- 
bukes of the bystanders had closed his lips, he would never have had 
another opportunity. Jesus was passing by and in a moment He 
would be gone and Bartimaeus would spend the rest of his days in 
darkness. How often do you and I allow Jesus of Nazareth to pass by 
without hailing Him, though we need to cry for mercy as much as the 
blind man by the gate. Our lives are filled with seasons of opportunity 
which we neglect. 

Youth is a great time of opportunity. Heaven lies about us in 
childhood. In Christian homes children are surrounded by holy in- 
fluences. Jesus is passing and re-passing through their lives. And 
in the house of God where children are brought together and are 
singing their hearty praises unto Him, we may believe that Jesus 
passeth not by, but remains with the children whom He loves. In 
later years our meetings with Jesus seem to become fewer. Perhaps 
the noise and business of the world have entered into our hearts and 
we do not hear His footsteps; perhaps we have forgotten the Friend 
of our childhood days and do not recognize Him. Friend, do not let 
Jesus of Nazareth pass by, lest He might pass out of your life for- 
ever and you be left blind by the roadside, but call to Him with all 
your might: "Jesus, Thou Son of David, have mercy on me!" 

Seasons of prosperity are seasons of opportunity. Then nothing is 
weighing heavily on our minds and we are in a receptive mood. Then 
we are not anxious and full of care, nor busied here and there with 
plans to provide for the necessities of the body, and we should at 
such times be especially ready to receive the Saviour who has so 
abundantly blessed us. Jesus passed on into Jericho and there He 
found Zaccheus, who was a rich man and who gave liberally of his 
wealth. Zaccheus was waiting for Jesus and ready to receive Him and 
the Master said: "This day is salvation come to thine house." 

Seasons of adversity are seasons of opportunity. The blind man's 
adversity was the cause of his salvation. Otherwise he might have 
paid no heed to Jesus passing along the road. One day ten lepers 
cried to Him from the roadside, and they received healing. In the 
hour of distress the Lord is nearer than we think. 

Is there adversity in your life? Is it poverty? Seek from the 
Master those riches which neither moth nor rust do corrupt. Is it 
sickness? Listen for His footsteps, call for mercy and He will either 
lift the cross from your shoulders or give you the strength to bear 
it. Is it bereavement? A child has been taken from your home. It 
is a pure jewel for the Master's crown. Perhaps a father or mother 
have departed. Jesus of Nazareth has passed by and taken His 
servant with Him. 

"Jesus of Nazareth passeth by." Never let Him pass without call- 
ing to Him and asking for His mercy and help. I read of no instance 
where that prayer was not granted. O Master, have mercy upon our 
blindness, have mercy upon our shortcomings, and have mercy upon 
our transgressions. 



a^loman'g Si^ini&tv^ 



She hath done what she could , , . and verily I say unto you, wheresoever this 
gospel shall he preached throughout the whole world, that also, which this woman hath 
done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her. — Mark, ziv: 8-9. 

^^^^^ HE Gospel of Jesus Christ is woman's charter of emanci- 
M C^ pation. Outside Christianity might has been right, so 
^L J woman has held a position little better than a servant or a 
^^"^ slave. Tell me the position of woman in any land, and I 
will tell you the state of its civilization. The fountain will not rise 
higher than its source. The hour of woman's emancipation struck 
when Christ was born. 

Women immediately came to the front in connection with our 
Lord's life. His ministry was carried on among them just as freely 
as among men. There was never any sign of difference although 
the disciples marvelled more than once when they saw their Master 
talking to a woman. They were numbered among His dearest friends 
and to their homes He went for rest and refreshment after His 
arduous labors. 

The prominence of women in the early church is also remark- 
able. Paul's first convert in Europe was Lydia, of Thyatira (Acts 
xvi, 14, 15). Peter being liberated from prison went to the house of 
Mary, the mother of Mark, where many of the disciples were gath- 
ered for prayer. Everywhere the women labored hand in hand with 
the apostles as active supporters and teachers of the faith. Priscilla 
instructed Apollos, and Timothy is urged to faith such as that of his 
mother and grandmother. St. Paul furthermore says that the women 
carried on most of the benevolent work of the early church. He 
sees a new destiny opening before them and says, "Woman's dignity 
depends not on outward adornment, but let the Christian woman 
clothe herself with good works." And that has been one of the 
glories of Christianity and is to-day woman's devotion to her Lord. 
Verily "she hath done what she could." 

The most telling work is often done behind the veil which is 
drawn over every home, and of which the world or the church hears 
little, and here it is that woman's ministry is most needed and is 
most effective. Mothers teaching children, wives pleading with hus- 
bands, sisters leading brothers with the strong hand of affection. 
Christian women have clothed themselves with good works as their 
robe of adornment — the habit which has given them the likeness of 
angels of mercy to the poor and the fallen, and of guidance to their 
homes and families. 

The incident from which our text is taken is typical of woman's 
attitude to Christ during His life. At His trial when few were His 
friends, and many clamored for His death, there was one class which 
was undivided, because unanimous in the love of Jesus — the women. 
They did not suspect Him, nor question His motives, nor spy upon 
Him. They trusted Him, they served Him, they adored Him. They 
made ready their sons to be His disciples. They gave Him a home 
whenever he would honor it with His presence, they gave Him of 



momm'0 9^inimv 



their substance and they anointed Him. They never vexed His heart, 
never disappointed Him, never failed Him, never denied Him. They 
sustained Him with their sympathy, wept over His sorrows and paid 
to Him their last tribute of devotion at His burial. 

It is not unknown that men will criticise women as deficient in 
judgment and unacquainted with affairs. Yet we men move on the 
lower level, where we deal with rules and plans and the machinery 
of life. When we rise to the tableland of goodness and truth, men 
move with leaden feet, and women fly with the wings of instinct and 
faith. Many of the men of His time undoubtedly looked upon Jesus 
as a heretic, probably dangerous to the nation. Time is the final 
arbiter, and has decided in favor of the womanly instinct. The mighty 
ecclesiastics were wrong and committed the master-crime of the cen- 
turies. The simple working women were right and did their best to 
redeem the crime. 

The anointing of Jesus at Bethany is typical of woman's work 
for the church. Behold the all-surrendering love and sublime devo- 
tion of this woman as she pours over him the ointment, bought with 
years of labor. She is a type of her sisters in all generations who 
have given their all to the Master and poured over Him the oint- 
ment of their devotion. Some who stood by said: "Why this waste?" 
and how often since then woman's devotion has been sneered at and 
her work hampered by mercenary considerations. There is some- 
thing inexpressibly sad, yet patient, tender and gentle in Christ's "Let 
her alone, she hath wrought a good work." Surely, never could there 
be waste in the ministry of love to Him! And as a rev/ard to her 
devotion Jesus raises to this woman and her deed of love a m.onu- 
ment which shall outlast marble or brass, the monument of eternal 
remembrance: "Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached, this shall 
be told for a memorial of her." 

Wherever woman will put her hand to the work she is in the 
van of advancement of the gospel of Jesus. She has gone to work 
side by side with her brethren in the great mission field, in the hos- 
pital, in the Sunday school, in the great boards of the church. As 
deaconess she has brought into her work that tact and gentleness, 
that insight and sympathy which is Christ-like. 

I read that the house was filled with the odor of the ointment, 
and to all time His house, the church, is filled with the same odor. 
Be it said to her eternal honor, the incense of woman's devotion rises 
continually from the church militant to the throne above. 

And above all, woman enters into the very heart of the religion 
of Jesus and receives the impress of His character. A true Christian 
woman attains the nearest likeness to Christ. This is the truth in 
that old legend of St. Veronica. When Jesus was bearing the heavy 
cross up the steep road to Calvary, he fell under the burden, and a 
woman stepped forward and wiped the blood and sweat from his 
countenance with a napkin. When afterwards she opened the napkin 
there was no stain upon it, but the likeness of the face of Christ. 



%\fanMsMns 



And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God hath led thee • • 
and that min doth not live hy bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the 
mouth of the Lord doth man live. ♦ * * Beware that thou forget not the Lord thy God, 
and say in thine heart, my power and the might of mine hand hath gotten me this 
wealth. — Deut. viii: 2-3-17. 

^^^^^ HE eighth chapter of Deuteronomy is a Thanksgiving 
M C^ proclamation which comes with authority. It is a procla- 
^ J mation and a judgment coming from no earthly ruler or 
^^^^ monarch, but from the very throne of God. It was given 
centuries ago in a distant land, but it might have been written to-day 
for the very land in which we live. 

Thanksgiving with us has passed into an institution, and like all 
such institutions it is liable to lose much of its original force and 
meaning. That we live in a land where the President even once a 
year calls upon all and sundry to thank God for His many blessings, 
is a matter for praise. But let us make Thanksgiving something more 
than a mere custom and the occasion for eating of large dinners. Let 
us get beyond the usual Thanksgiving platitudes and conventional- 
ities, and in a real and deep sense lift our hearts in gratitude to 
the Giver of all good. So I come to you with a proclamation thou- 
sands of years old from the Father-heart of God to all His children 
upon whom he bestows benefits. 

"Thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led 
thee." Such a review of life's way is a remembrance of blessing, a 
remembrance of unworthiness and a remembrance of hope. 

First, it is a remembrance of blessing. The history of this nation 
is in many ways parallel to that of Israel. Our people were led out 
of the house of bondage into the freedom of individual national life. 
They were brought into the great wilderness which has been made 
to blossom as the rose. And God has led us by a mighty hand 
through wars and difficulties and great perils and placed upon us the 
seal of a great destiny. And surely this is God's country where He has 
opened His bountiful hand and poured out His riches. It is a land 
of brooks of water, of fountains and depths that spring out of valleys 
and hills; a land of wheat and barley and vines and fig trees and 
pomegranates; a land of oil-olive and honey; a land wherein thou 
shalt eat bread without scarceness; a land whose stones are iron and 
out of whose hills thou may est dig brass (Deut. 8:7-9). God has 
blessed and multiplied our commerce, our enterprises and our har- 
vests and given us wealth beyond the dreams of avarice. 

But Thanksgiving should be individual as well as national. It is 
well for us to review at times the way which God has led us through 
life. Ingratitude is a vice for which no one has a good word to say. 
Let us dread lest even our loving Father may tire of heaping benefits 
upon ungrateful children. Ingratitude is often caused by an inade- 
quate conception of the blessings bestowed upon us. Write down 
the blessings which have come into your life in the past year, and 
you will find the list much larger and greater than you suspected. 



CSanfe^gibmo: 



Secondly, Thanksgiving is a remembrance of unworthiness. Who 
is worthy of God's benefits? Is this nation worthy? It is known as 
a Christian nation, and we are glad to believe that among the nations 
of the earth its influence is for uprightness and justice. But we 
cannot shut our eyes to the fact that there are great and glaring evils 
which exist unmolested and even protected under our national ban- 
ner. We have gained wealth and power, but the danger of our success 
is great. We begin to say in our heart: "My power and the might 
of mine hand hath gotten me this wealth." We grow up with strong 
pride in our land, in her vast extent, her wealth, her noble buildings 
and cities, her endless railways, and in all her prosperity. These 
things are in danger of shutting out of sight God's bountiful hand 
which bestows it all. And after all these are only the husks of pros- 
perity. That land possesses real prosperity which produces brave 
and honest men, is noted for domestic purity and holds sacred the 
marriage vow, whose valleys and hills are dotted with Christian 
homes, and gives justice to the weak as well as the rich and powerful. 

"Man doth not live by bread alone," says this ancient Thanks- 
giving proclamation. If that be true, what a commentary it is on 
the condition of the present day world. It is for material things that 
men toil and struggle and expend their best energies. Now if ever, 
is it needful to thunder in the ears of the people: "Man shall not 
live by bread alone." "But," you say, "Look at all we are doing for 
the cause of science and education. We provide that no boy or girl 
shall grow up without at least an elementary education, and behold 
our innumerable colleges and great universities." Yes, but by the 
fruit of the tree of knowledge alone doth not man live. May the 
tree of knowledge and science stand and flourish forever, but its 
fruit is not bread for sorrowing and sinning humanity. 

God has blessed this nation with a bountiful harvest but man 
shall not live by that alone, "but every word that proceedeth out 
of the mouth of God." Centuries later Jesus announced Himself as 
the "Bread of Life." And still and forever the Incarnate Word of 
God is the bread by which the nations must live. 

And then Thanksgiving brings a remembrance of hope. With 
what trust and confidence, with what courage and hope may we 
meet the future. Our God is not a god of caprice that He would bless 
us to-day and curse us to-morrow; that He would feed us to-day and 
starve us to-morrow. He has set our lives in a land of abundance, 
He has been our strength and defence and given us songs in the night 
of trial. And we look forward with the hope that in the deepest sense 
of the word this nation may some day become God's chosen people for 
the spreading of liberty and Christianity throughout the world. 

And surely we should be a thankful people lifting hearts full of 
gratitude to a loving Father, not once a year, but every day in the 
year. And let our thanksgiving not be only empty words, but let us 
strive to acquire the Master's method of giving thanks. He "went 
about doing good." 



Ci)e Witak ^pot 




This linage's head was of fine gold, his hreast and arms of silver, his belly and thighs 
of brass, his legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay. — Dan. ii: 32-33. 

UCH was the image which Nebuchadnezzar saw in his 
dream. It was a fine image to look upon, magnificent in 
its proportions. Its head of fine gold towered high in the 
air. Its breast and arms of silver, its thighs of brass, its 
legs of brass and iron spoke of beauty and strength, and one might 
have seen that image many times without noting its weak point. It, 
however, had its weak point. Its feet were partly of iron and partly 
of clay. And a stone was loosed from the hillside and rolled against 
the clay feet and the image toppled over and was broken to pieces. 

The story of this image is a parable true to life. We all have our 
v/eak spots. A man has built up a fine character; he has an intellect 
like fine gold, accomplishments like purified silver, the strength of 
welded brass and iron. But all this noble superstructure is sup- 
ported on clay feet. We marvel some times at the sudden downfall 
of an honored and upright man. His friends and the community are 
shocked that he has proven so weak, in whom they trusted. Tempta- 
tion has a fatal knack of picking out our weak spots. Satan tries 
every part of our character until he finds the clay feet. Think for 
a moment how it has been in your own experience. There is one 
besetting sin against which you have striven, one flaw in your charac- 
ter of which you are conscious and which you have tried to guard, 
there is one weak spot where temptation assails you and where you 
are so often overcome. 

Ahab, King of Israel, went into battle fully armed and confident. 
He had on his trusty helmet, and breastplate and greaves and a 
shield was carried before him. Ahab knew that there were joints in 
his armor, but he thought them too small to be of any consequence. 
But a man in the opposite camp drew a bow at a venture. His arrow 
was aimed at nothing in particular, but it smote the King of Israel 
between the joints of his armor and Ahab died from the wound. 
Think where the flaw is in your armor. Many a man has gone to 
the battle confident in his own strength and been laid low by some 
chance temptation. There is probably some part of your nature that 
should be covered with a double plate of steel. 

Scientists at different times have given considerable attention to 
the study of immortality. Darwin has given probably the most ade- 
quate scientific definition of immortality. He says it is perfect cor- 
respondence to a perfect environment. But every human body has 
some constitutional weakness, a tendency to some disease, which, 
gradually gaining the upper hand, results in death. In the same way 
v/e have within us a tendency to some sin, a constitutional weakness 
of character which needs careful guarding. 

Achilles, the son of Peleus, King of Myrmidons, was the hero of 
the Trojan war. When a child, his mother, Thetis, in order to make 
him invulnerable, dipped him in the river Styx. Every part of him 
was covered with the water except the heel by which she held him. 



%it mtali &pot 



During that great war, arrows and swords and spears had no effect on 
the body of Achilles. But one day he was going about the walls of 
Troy and a soldier threw a spear at him. It struck Achilles on the heel 
which his mother had held when she dipped him in the Styx, and the 
wound caused the death of the hero. 

In the history of mankind there are no immortal heroes. Whether 
it be clay feet, or whether it be joints in the armor or whether it 
be the heel of Achilles, they all have their weak spots which pronounce 
them human. The whole Bible recognizes this human frailty, and 
continually warns us. Jesus, speaking of His intimate knowledge of 
human nature, says: "The spirit indeed is willing but the flesh ia 
weak." You say, "that fits my case exactly. I have wrestled with 
my besetting sin, I have striven sincerely to overcome it, I have 
prayed for strength and my spirit desires purity and uprightness, 
but temptation continually finds the clay feet." The disciples wished 
to stand by Jesus in the hour of trial, they desired to watch with 
Him in Gethsemane, they thought that denial of Him would be the 
last sin that would overtake them. Jesus, knowing their hearts, says: 
"Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation." 

St. Paul, speaking out of his own experience, says: "Take the 
whole armor of God; take the helmet of salvation, and the breast- 
plate of righteousness, and the shield of faith, and have your feet 
shod with the preparation of the Gospel of Peace, and have your 
armor girt about you with the girdle of truth, and in your hand take 
the sword of the Spirit." You will note that in this catalogue of 
the Christian's armor everything is for defence except the sword 
of the Spirit. And so the word of God recognizes that every part of 
man's nature must be carefully guarded. Speaking further out of his 
own personal experience, St. Paul says: "My strength was made per- 
fect in weakness." That seems a paradoxical statement. Paul 
thought he was a strong, self-sufficient man relying wholly on his 
own wisdom and judgment and strength. One day he found out that 
he was very weak, and he went to the Master for strength. Telling 
about it afterwards he says: "When I am weak, then am I strong." 
That is, when he recognized his own weakness he went to God for 
strength and that is the strength that holds. 

There was a blind man who sat in the gate of Jericho. He heard 
that Jesus of Nazareth was passing and he cried out: "Jesus, Thou 
Son of David, have mercy on me," and the Master's strength went 
out towards the blind man's weakness and he received his sight. 
Jairus had an only daughter whom he loved better than his life. He 
knew that she was beyond human help, so in his despair he sought 
Jesus and said: "Com.e and lay Thy hand upon her and she shall 
live." Jesus came and lifted her into life. You have one life and one 
soul. It is the most precious thing you possess. The whole world 
with its wealth cannot buy your soul's salvation. But you can go 
to the Fountain of life and strength and say: "Master, Thou knowest 
my weakness, but in Thy power I shall be made strong." 



i^elpfng or J^intiering 



He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth 
abroad, — Matthew xii: 30. 

^^^^^ HE peril which threatens Christians and Christianity is the 
M C\ peril of indifference. We are living in an age of toleration. 
wL J We have ceased to desire to force our particular views upon 
^^1^ other people save by methods of persuasion. Torture and 
excommunication are things of the past. 

I believe that there cannot be too much toleration. No man has 
a right to usurp the judgment throne of God and pass sentence upon 
his fellow men. But is it not true, nevertheless, that this atmosphere 
of freedom in which we draw our breath has made us rather indiffer- 
ent to religious truth? And while we would by no means compel 
belief as the church once tried to do, yet we cannot shut our eyes to 
the fact that the old days of persecution were the days of purity of 
faith. The Church of Christ persecuted, has been the Church of 
Christ pure. The Church of Christ patronized has always become 
the Church of Christ impure. When Constantine the emperor 
espoused the cause of Christianity it was one of the saddest days for 
the church, and wherever it has held a position under the wing of 
the state, there has passed upon it the most blighting influence which 
has ever touched the church. 

When men and women had to face death for the things that they 
believed, they were earnest and their faith was pure. Men and women 
who were not prepared to do this kept outside the Church of Jesus 
Christ. But all that has passed away. No one will persecute you 
now for being a Christian, and so the danger which threatens us to- 
day is the danger of indifference. 

Now, when we come with our indifference into the presence of 
the Master, He pronounces sentence upon us immediately in unmis- 
takable terms. He makes a clean line of demarkation, setting some 
people on one side of that line and some upon the other. "He that 
is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me 
scattereth." One can imagine that the words fell from the lips of 
Jesus quietly and calmly, and yet it is a sharp-edged sword dividing 
men swiftly and surely into two opposite camps leaving no "via 
media," no neutral ground. 

Did you ever think how our division and God's division of human- 
ity differ? We divide generally into three classes; God into two. We 
say, upper, middle and lower classes; God says: "These are with me, 
these are against me." Our division is horizontal. We think of men, 
as it were, in layers one above another. God's division is perpendicu- 
lar; some on the right side and some on the left. 

Of late years we have heard much of the "solidarity of human- 
ity." It is one of these phrases which sounds as if there were a good 
deal in it and men have made the most of it. "The solidarity of 
humanity" — what do writers and speakers mean by it? It means that 
humanity is not a conglomeration of units, each separate and alone, 
but that humanity is one; that all men are dependent upon all other 



I^elpmg; or ^mbttfng 



men. Every nation of the world is linked to every other nation. 
Every generation has a vital relation to every other generation. The 
child is heir of all the ages which precede it. This is God's thought 
for the human race: "He hath made of one blood all the nations of 
the earth." This was the ideal of humanity upon which Jesus based 
all His work and teaching. 

But it seems as if this ideal were far from being realized. 
Humanity is broken up, split, divided. Even the nations of Europe, 
which are supposed to be civilized. Christianized nations, watch each 
other with suspicion, armed to the teeth. Then when you come to 
the church do you get any comfort out of the divisions in the Church 
of God? I hope not. God's ideal never was that His people should 
be a divided people. Come down into private life, and we are look- 
ing to-day upon one of the saddest sights, the break-up of the home. 
Children are growing away from their parents and parents away 
from their children; the old strong bands which make a strong people 
because they are strong in family relationships, are passing away. 

The Master announces Himself as the Gatherer of God's people. 
And how we need the Gatherer! How we need to enter into that 
larger ideal that we are one the world over; that every man with 
the image of God upon him and the breath of God in him, is a 
brother man to be loved, and served, and cared for. And Jesus says 
furthermore that you and I are either helping or hindering Him in 
that work — that we are either gathering or scattering. 

So many of us try to be neutral. "I do not know that I am 
helping the work of the church and the cause of Christianity much," 
you say, "but then, I am not hindering it." Yes, you are. To do 
nothing is to be a hindrance. You have been on the busy thorough- 
fare of a great city. Suppose you stop in the middle of the side- 
walk and look in a window. You are not there long until a man in 
blue puts his hand on your shoulder and says: "Move on." "Why 
should I move on? I am not interfering with anyone." "You are 
blocking the traffic," he says, "you can go this way or that way, but 
you cannot stand still." 

No, my friends, you cannot stand still. The moment you stand 
still and say: "I am just going to be an interested onlooker," you 
become an obstacle in His way of progress. If you stand, someone 
else will stand, too. If you are not with Him you are against Him. 
What the Master wants to-day in the cities and villages of America, 
are men and women who are living with Him, and gathering with 
Him. Let parents begin in the home. America is waiting for the 
manifestation of the sons and daughters of God, to become part of 
the great force which is gathering men together. 

What we want is for men and women to choose their side. Do 
not say "It is no use for me to pretend to take sides with Christ, 
I can do so little." It is not any extra activity which you may en- 
gage in, but it is your life that helps or hinders Him, and it is your 
life that He wants. 



C{)e dreamer and ^is Dreams 

Behold, this dreamer cometh. — Gen. zxxvii: 19. 

HIKE all the world's great hearts, Jesus of Nazareth was 
looked upon as a dreamer. People in His day had not 
learnt to look upon their dreamers and their dreams as their 
best possessions, but in this age of the world we have begun 
to recognize that the dreams of to-day are the sureties of the future. 
The institutions of to-day are the fruits of the aspirations of yester- 
day. Because the young Galilean went about doing good and spoke 
those parables and apothegms which idealize brotherhood and the 
sanctity of human life, we have the best Christian civilization of the 
present day. 

Our text is from the history of Joseph. The life of Joseph is a 
beautiful illustration of God's providential leading, of His use of indi- 
vidual lives for great and hidden purposes, and of His turning the 
evil which men perpetrate into good. Between the life of Joseph and 
that of Christ there is a striking parallelism. Like Joseph, Jesus was 
His Father's well beloved Son, like Joseph, Jesus was the best of 
brothers, yet hated and respected by His own; like Joseph, Jesus was 
sent by His Father to His brethren, and from hate and envy sold for 
a few paltry pieces of silver. Alike, they endured a great tempta- 
tion without sin. Joseph became the saviour of those who had sold 
him, so Jesus became the saviour not only of Israel but of the whole 
world. 

We see how close is the parallelism; and like Joseph, Jesus was 
considered a dreamer. Some looked upon His dreams as idle but 
harmless; others thought to take good care that His dreams should 
not come true. We can well believe that as Jesus passed along the 
streets in Jerusalem people, seeing Him coming, smiled derisively, 
and said: "Behold this dreamer cometh." Now we look upon these 
dreams every day being fulfilled. We see them as the greatest reali- 
ties which the whole world knows, we see them as the hope and 
prayer of every right-minded person. 

Christ came with a dream of a kingdom. They wanted a king- 
dom, but something more substantial than that which he promised. 
His kingdom was not based on nationality, territorial boundaries, 
race, tongue or color. His kingdom was to be universal as mankind. 
Its laws were not written on statute books nor enforced by police and 
courts of law; but written on the hearts of men, and enforced by 
their own consciences. "My kingdom is not of this world," said 
Jesus to Pilate, and Pilate smiled to himself and thought, "Not a 
very dangerous rival to the great Rom.an Empire." 

He came with a dream of His ov/n kingship. They wanted a king- 
One v/ho would oust Herod and throw off the Roman yoke. They 
wanted a mighty man of valor like David; one celebrated for his 
wisdom and magnificence like Solomon. But Jesus wanted no palace 
overlooking the Temple hill in Jerusalem, no summer palace on the 
shores of Tiberias. He wanted no court of attendants where syco- 



%it SDteamer anti 1^10 SDteam^ 



phants might seek favor. He was not to be a king of the Jews 
only, lording it over tributary tribes and nations; but His kingship was 
to be as universal as His kingdom, a king of the South Sea Islanders 
as well as of the Jewish Sanhedrin, a king wherever God's will 
should be done on earth as it is done in heaven. 

He came with a dream of universal brotherhood. They desired 
a united and knit-together Israel, that they might stand against 
their foes and be effectually aggressive. But His dream of brother- 
hood was such that a man might recognize a brother in spite of 
tongue, color, customs, tastes and conditions. A brotherhood where 
allegiance and love to the same Master should always be a strong 
link, where the helping hand should always be outstretched, where 
the love of our fellowman should rule our conduct. Paul had grasped 
that idea of brotherhood when he wrote: "There is neither Jew nor 
Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor 
female; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." 

He came with a dream of universal fatherhood. We have Abra- 
ham for our father," said the Jew, "we are the people of the cove- 
nant, the chosen people of God. God is the God of the Jew and all 
others are outsiders." But Jesus announced the universal fatherhood 
of God. Glorious conception! God is not the God of one nation or 
one class; not only of the rich or the poor, or of the wise, or the 
ignorant, but of all people. Every one has access to Him. And see 
how the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man are insepara- 
ble. We are all children of the same Father, and it is not seemly 
that there should be strife and contention and hatred and malice and 
bitterness among brethren. This ought to rule our whole life and 
conduct, to deal with people as v/e would with a brother or a sister. 
We acknowledge God's Fatherhood and our brotherhood when we 
bow our heads and pray, "Our Father." 

"Behold this dreamer cometh," and His dreams, those ideals 
which lived in the Master's mind have become realities. His king- 
dom is indeed a universal kingdom. Every year sees its boundaries 
widen. The continents and the islands of the sea have become parts 
of that mighty empire. They crown Him King in the tropics, in the 
Arctic regions, in the East and the V/est. Vows of fealty are taken 
to Him in every language under heaven. Every year the Fatherhood 
of God is better understood and acknowledged. We are losing un- 
worthy conceptions of God and learning His goodness and His father- 
love to mankind. And, therefore, the brotherhood of man progresses 
also. There is still strife among brethren and great questions which 
face us like the questions between labor and capital. But never in 
the world's history has so much been done to bring about amicable 
relations between man and man. 

O, Thou Dreamer of Galilee, may Thy Kingdom widen its borders 
and Thy Kingship increase its sway; may the Father-love of God fill 
the earth and sway the hearts of men toward a universal brotherhood. 



Clje first Cl)r(0tmafi; Carol 



sine unto the Lord a new sonsr, for He hath done marveUous things.— Ps. xcviii: 1. 
Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.— Lnke u; 14. 



GHRISTIANITY came in with a song. It was performed in 
God's great cathedral and the dome thereof was hung with 
the twinkling lamps of God's architecture. 
Christianity came in with a song. It was the carol of 
the Nativity and it gave birth to a world of singing. There was 
not much song in the world before Christ came, and there is not 
much to-day, where Christ is unknown. The children of the heathen 
are silent children, for the joy of the Christmas carol has never set 
their hearts and voices singing. That first Christmas carol was 
heard only by the shepherds on the Bethlehem plains, but the world 
thrilled to the song, for the Consolation of Israel had come. 

Christianity came in with a song. I wish I could tell you the 
story of the Christmas carol, how it has gone about the world and 
brought peace and happiness wherever it has come. It is a won- 
derful story which has never been written, the story of man's life, 
of his sin and his restoration; a story of mighty conquests with 
minor strains which tell of martyrs to the faith. It is the story of 
Christianity, for it began with the announcement of Christ's birth. 

Long ago when Christianity was in its infancy and Christians 
were a persecuted sect, they hid from their enemies in the catacombs 
under the city of Rome. In the dreary underground passages they 
held their worship and sang with joy their Christmas carol despite 
their hardships and persecutions. It seemed that their own troubles 
intensified their love to the Master who came in lowliness and pov- 
erty as a little Child. 

Europe was filled with wild tribes of barbarians which dismem- 
bered and overthrew the great Roman empire. They in turn were 
conquered and subdued not by sword or spear, but by the simple story 
of the Child in the manger of Bethlehem and the song of the angels 
on that night. Then the Christmas carol came into the far North 
and made a season of joy in the midst of the dull winter days and 
long nights. The holly and the fir tree and the yule-log were brought 
in as of old, but that ancient festival had been embraced by God's 
love and life, and the song that sounded through the stormy winter 
night was the carol of the Nativity. "Glory to God in the Highest." 
Centuries later the Christmas carol came to a new world. The 
staunch ship which carried it weathered the storms of many months, 
and at last the sturdy pilgrims landed on the coast of the new world. 
They braved many dangers, subdued the forests, built their cabins 
and set up their family altars. Then the Christmas carol rang forth 
in this new land, gave them courage in their hardships, sweetened 
their toil, and saved a continent for Christ. And there would be 
still more wonderful things to relate if the story of the Christmas 
carol were written. How men have gone single-handed among 
savages, not protected by armor nor carrying weapons,, and have con- 



%it Mt0t CfitfetmafiJ Carol 



quered their evil hearts with the story of the Christ-Child, and they 
also have joined in the great world-chorus which sings the Christ- 
mas carol. O, it is a song of joy, and of peace and of victory. It' 
is a song of God's love, who gave His Son, and a song of hope for 
the future of mankind. 

"I heard the bells on Christmas day 
Their old, familiar carols play, 

And wild and sweet 

The words repeat 
Of peace on earth, good will to men! 
And thought how, as the day had come, 
The belfries of all Christendom 

Had rolled along 

The unbroken song. 
Of peace on earth, good will to men!" 

But there is another sound that seems at times to drown out the 
song, for the Christmas carol is not yet wholly victorious. It is the 
tumult of men's hate which seethes as a raging cauldron. There is 
the sound of curses and of carnage and of men groaning under the 
heel of the oppressor. There is the sound of great wars which bring 
terror and death and sorrow to thousands, for the "Peace" of the 
Christmas song is not as yet universal. 

"It was as if an earthquake rent 
The hearthstones of a continent." 

And on all sides we still hear the lamentation of the broken 
hearted, the cry of the sin-laden, of the sick and in prison. Evil and 
hate are still strong in men's bosoms, and misery is before our eyes 
continually. And in the hour of our despair we cry: 

"Hate is strong 
And mocks the song 
Of peace on earth, good will to men!" 
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep 
"God is not dead; nor doth He sleep! 
The Wrong shall fail 
The Right prevail 
With peace on earth, good will to men!" 

And with the bells we hear a quiet voice which speaks with in- 
sistence: "I have come to bind up the broken hearted, to give de- 
liverance to the captive, sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who 
are bruised, to lift the burden of sin and sorrow from hum.anity and 
to give them songs in the night. I have come to bring peace and 
charity and good will among men, and the time shall be when they 
shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain." And as we 
hear those words of the Prince of Peace, we begin to understand that 
tumults and wars, hate and contention, oppression and sin, are only 
discords which one day shall blend into harmony with the Peace Song 
of the Son of God. 

Blessed be the Christmas season with its song and story and its 
Love-Gift from the Father's heart. And blessed be the Christmas 
carol with its song of peace, of the home and of the fireside. It is 
an old song, yet ever new for the Christ-Child is yearly becoming 
dearer to our hearts, and the song gains new depth and meaning. 
Let us all learn to sing it fervently, joyfully: "Glory to God in the 
highest, on earth peace, good will toward men." 



Oaalfeins SKKitl) <^oti 



And Enoch walked with God. and he was not; for God took him. — Gen.v: 24. 

^^^^^ HIS fifth chapter of Genesis is like an ancient burial place 
m C^\ with only the names and the ages on the tombstones, and 
^ J the brief epitaph, "He died." This is a chapter of non- 
^^^ entities. They left no just and glowing memorial behind 
them. They left no trace of goodness or virtue. Their lives were 
not felt and their deaths were not lamented. They dropped no quick- 
ening words which lived like music in the lives of their descendants. 
They lived like the common run of selfish people. The earth was 
made for their special gratification; the sun shone and the rain 
descended to bless their fields. They lived passive and useless lives 
and in such a world of ours that is no small sin. 

Remember, that in our Lord's picture of the judgment some are 
condemned not because of any great crime which they had commit- 
ted but because of the good that they had omitted to do. "I was an 
hungered and ye gave me no meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me 
no drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me not in; naked, and ye 
clothed me not; sick and in prison, and ye visited me not. And verily 
I say unto you inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the least of these, 
ye did it not unto me." Some people in this world are blots upon hu- 
manity, some are blanks, and some are blessings. The first two our 
Lord writes in the same condemnation. 

There is no blank in this world without a corresponding blessing; 
there is no barren spot which does not in some way indicate a brighter 
and a better state. Hence we find in the midst of this chapter of 
blanks one huge blessing: "Enoch walked with God." Here is a 
plant growing in the desert, an evidence of influence from the sky. 
Mungo Park traveling in the African desert, overcome by hunger and 
thirst lay himself down to die. Under him was the burning sand;, 
over him the hot, brassy sky. But his eye lighted on one tiny flower. 
The sight revived his hopes, for he argued with a logic which was 
irresistibly conclusive, "If God takes care of this flower in the desert, 
He cannot have forgotten me." That was strictly and beautifully 
true. The moisture from distant oceans had come to refresh it; the 
chemistry of a soil not utterly exhausted nourished it, and God's smile 
gave it its tints, and God's breath gave it fragrance. That flower in 
the midst of the burning sands was an evidence to Park that God 
was there. So here an Enoch walking with God was a flower in the 
midst of the barren desert — an evidence that God was there though 
the world knew it not. 

There never was a desert in which there was not a flower; never 
a night without its star; never in the history of the world a century 
so barren that there was not some one v/ho adorned it by his virtues, 
or contributed to it by his learning and his goodness. In those far- 
off ages among the Methuselahs and Lamechs and Cains, we find an 



Enoch. In the dark hour o£ Jewish history when Jesus came, we find 
a Simeon and an Anna awaiting Him in the temple. 

"Enoch walked with God." No Christian biography could be 
more complete, more eloquently descriptive. If Enoch walked with 
God, he must have believed in Him as the Father of mankind. He 
must have recognized His goodness and His love in the world about 
him and been grieved at the wickedness which he saw every day. 

And Enoch must have agreed with God. If two people differ 
politically, morally, religiously, unless they have extremely good and 
sainted tempers they cannot walk long together in friendship and 
peace. Differences of opinion lead to differences of conduct. The 
instant you begin to differ from God, you begin to say: "Well, I like 
this and God condemns it; I don't like that and God commands it.'* 
Then you depart from God, "for how can two walk together unless 
they be agreed." 

But agreement with God must not only be in mind, but in 
heart. Differing from another intellectually is endurable, but when 
we differ from another in heart and feeling there is a quarrel. Nnw, 
the human heart, Scripture tells us, is "enmity against God." This 
enmity must be dissolved, and love, the only bond between earth and 
heaven, must take its place. You may know all theological disputes 
which have stirred the world, you may know all creeds and con- 
fessions and yet not one truth may be lodged in your heart as a living 
and a saving force. "Except a man be born again he cannot see the 
kingdom of God," said Jesus, and the great word stands. 

Enoch must have had perfect confidence in God. A soldier will 
not march to battle unless he has confidence in his commander. A 
sailor will not go to sea unless he has confidence in his captain. A 
patient will not undergo an operation unless he has confidence in 
the surgeon. A Christian will not be faithful and true and endure 
unto the end unless he has confidence in God. He who walked with 
God may have trials, sorrows, afflictions, but he never despairs, for 
he says: "God is my refuge and strength," and He has said: "I will 
never leave thee nor forsake thee." He recollects these beautiful 
promises, pleads them in prayer and feels the weight and force and 
consolation of them in time of difficulty, and in the fullness of trust 
he says with St. Paul: "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor 
life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, 
nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, 
shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ 
Jesus our Lord." 

Note how different Enoch's end is spoken of from that of the 
others mentioned in this chapter. "Enoch was not, for God took him." 
One day his place was empty and men drew their own conclusions. He 
had been the friend of God. Where should he be but in God's dwell- 
ing place. "God has taken him," they said, and their thoughts fol- 
lowed upward and essayed to conceive of the final bliss of the man 
who had walked with God. 



(^rotofng €>ld 



We all do fade as a leaf. — ^Isaiah Ixiv: 6. 



^•4^^^ HE year is growing old in beauty and in peace. One per- 
M C^ feet day follows another; but there is a chill in the air, 
^L J and white frost of mornings which prophesies the coming 

^^■' winter. The leaves ripen and fall, but first they put on 
robes of marvelous beauty. There is a bluer haze upon the moun- 
tains and a yellower tinge to the sunshine. The year is growing old. 
It is an art to grow old gracefully. Those who are approaching the 
autumn of life should know two things well: 

How to hold on. Usefulness is not over at life's meridian, the 
Oslerites to the contrary notwithstanding. You may have the most 
effective years of your life before you. Caesar planned his victorious 
campaigns after he was fifty. Milton wrote his "Paradise Lost" after 
he became old and blind. Bismarck and Gladstone did mighty work 
when their hair was white as snow. What strength and wisdom built 
on mature experience, have come from the lips and pens of many 
men when the shadows were lengthening toward the sunset. 

How to let go. Old Simeon knew how when he said: "Now 
lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen 
Thy salvation." Paul knew how when he wrote: "I am ready to 
be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought 
a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith." The 
man who has lived well is not afraid to let go of life. 

An autumn walk through the forest reveals indescribable beauty. 
No artist can paint it; no poet can sing it. Well lived lives also 
come to their beauty in the autumn. In youth the beauty is on the 
outside and often hardly skin-deep. In old age it is beauty of char- 
acter and beauty of soul, and it shines out through the countenance. 
Leaves do not fall because they are frost-bitten, as is commonly sup- 
posed, but because they are ripe and ready for falling. So our lives 
ripen in the years which God has given us, and then the great Reaper 
comes and gathers us into His sheaves. The soil furnishes the leaf 
with silica for its framework; all else comes from the air and the sun. 
So our life, our real life, which is spiritual in its nature comes from 
above. No chill of autumn winds can reach the soul. The frame- 
work, the body, departs to its native soil, but that which the frame- 
work holds merges into the realms of eternal life. 

It is an art to grow old cheerfully. Holmes wrote: 

"And if I should chance to be 
The last leaf upon the tree 

In the spring, 
Let them smile, as I do now, 
At the old forsaken hough 

Where I cling." 

Who has not been charmed and cheered by that brief period of 
balmy weather knov/n in Canada and the Northern States as Indian 
summer? There is something strangely attractive in these few, short, 
tranquil days of late autumn, coming as they often do between a 



(Etotoino; DlH 



period of tempestuous weather and the commencement of the frosts. 
The face of nature is still sunny and bright and beautiful. There is 
the rich tinge of the broad, red sun blending the thousand hues of 
hill and forest and lake, and then there is the gorgeous autumnal sun- 
set closing the short day. 

Some people grow old like that. They have their Indian sum- 
mer. There is about them the peace and tranquility of another world, 
and the quiet cheerfulness which looks upon the evening of life with 
few regrets. 

It is an art to grow old sturdily. A healthy tree loses its leaves 
but it stands the blasts of winter uninjured. A robust old age stands 
on the record of a clean-lived youth. Shakespeare makes one of his 
old men say: 

"Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty; 
For in my youth I never did apply 
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood; 
Nor did with unhashful foreheid woo 
The means of weakness and debility; 
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter, 
Frosty, but kindly." 

There is scarcely a more pitiful sight under the sun than helpless 
and dependent old age; when the powers of the body are gone and 
aches and pains make the weary hours a torture; when the powers 
of mind have become dulled and childish, and when memory is only 
a sigh of regret for misspent days. So few of us appreciate life at 
its true value until it has come to the sere and yellow leaf. We sell 
golden hours for a mess of pottage. We neglect the seed time and 
therefore reap a scanty harvest. By many indiscretions and excesses 
we are laying up for ourselves trouble and pain in the years to come. 
Our sins against the body find us out and demand retribution just as 
surely as our sins against the soul. "Behold, God is not mocked.** 

"We all do fade as a leaf." That is the one thing that is certain 
to happen to everyone. The black camel kneels at every gate. But 
to the man of true faith and a godly life there is no terror in advanc- 
ing years. He looks upon the falling leaf and knows that the death 
of the present will issue in another resurrection when the spring sun 
shines. He looks upon the beautiful world in which he lives, but he 
knows that it is only the antechamber to the throne-room of the King. 
He looks toward the sunset and lies down to rest, knowing that he 
shall awake when a more glorious sunrise gilds the hilltops. 

No one can look upon the earth with its aspects of beauty and 
its changing seasons without seeing the love and care of God every- 
where. But it is even more evident in your life. God cares for you 
— therefore in the wild night of storm He shall come walking upon the 
waves, to bid the storm cease. God cares for you — therefore His 
whole kingdom of love yearns and waits for your homecoming. And 
he who is sheltered within the heart of God has found a peace-cham- 
ber where he can retreat from the pursuit of worldly jealousy, ambi- 
tion and strife. The darker the night and the louder the tempest, so 
much the more are the security and the blessed peace. 



%\ft Citp eternal 



He looked for a city which hath foundations whose builder and Maker is God.^ 
Heh. xi: 10. 

DO man-built city is permanent. Babylon of old had great 
stone walls fifteen miles square and eighty-seven feet thick, 
but it passed away and we are digging its ancient palaces 
from under the ground. Rock walls crumble to the dust, 
and even the mountains wear away by the action of wind and weather. 
Ancient men of power and insight saw the decay and transiency of 
all things and they longed for something that should abide. They 
built their cities on the rock-ribbed hills, but the tooth of time gnawed 
at their portals and the enemy came and pulled down their walls. Man 
felt within himself something which rebelled against the transiency 
of all things material, something which cried out for what is perma- 
nent, eternal. So ancient men of faith looked for a city whose archi- 
tect was God, built of material which time could not crumble. 

Now, note that only spiritual things last, such as faith and love 
and good deeds. Abraham had faith in God long before we laid the 
foundations of our cities. Love ruled the world before our moun- 
tains were chiseled into shape, and before the river flowed through 
the valley. The memory and influence of a great and good deed 
shall remain, when the monument raised to commemorate it has 
crumbled to dust. Only spiritual things are permanent. 

Then the City Eternal must be spiritual. We have heard and 
read much speculation as to what sort of a place heaven is, as to 
what sort of a city it was for which Abraham looked. But you are 
not interested in what I may imagine about it, nor am I interested 
in what you may imagine about it, but we are both interested in what 
God has to say about it. In this work-a-day-world it should help us 
to bear our burdens more bravely, and help us to holier living if we 
also were looking for a city whose builder and maker is God. 

Heaven then, is a place of incomparable beauty. The God of the 
Bible is a God of beauty. The God of nature is a God of beauty. The 
greatest artist has never imagined or spread upon canvas anything 
which is not far surpassed in beauty in this world which He made. It 
is true that the beauty of creation has been marred to us by sin. Our 
every faculty has been blunted and stunted. The weed, the thorn, 
and the brier spring up, the insect devours the rose, and death and 
decay bring loathesome sights. But in heaven will be the perfection 
of beauty, where all earthly comparisons fail. Some of us have seen 
beautiful visions upon earth. We have seen mountains rearing their 
snow-crowned heads above the clouds; we have seen the vista of 
rolling hills and verdant valleys; we have seen the heavens bejeweled 
with their countless stars; we have caught the odors that float through 
the summer night in park and garden. But all these are but faint 
shadows of the beauty that shall inhabit that City of God. 

But far more important, heaven will be a place of ennobling and 
holy companionships. The best and the wisest, the purest and noblest 



Wbt Citt (Etetnal 



and most unselfish of all ages will be there. All who have trusted 
in the atoning blood of Christ. All the dear ones who have loved 
their Lord. There are many who strive with all their might to get 
into the best society on earth, and that is all right if it really be the 
best society, and not merely the society of wealth and fashion and 
foolishness. But the best society of this world will be nothing to 
the best society of heaven. Eternity shall be passed in the presence 
of God and of the Master. "I go to prepare a place for you," He 
said, "that where I am there ye may be also." To St. Paul this was 
one of the most attractive thoughts about heaven. 

On the other hand there will be no unpleasant or degrading com- 
panionships there. The lewd, the vulgar and the obscene will not be 
there. The avaricious and the selfish will not be there. The slanderer 
the backbiter, the hypocrite, the profane scoffer, the infidel will not 
be there. No money nor influence nor cunning will get them in. 
"There shall in no wise enter anything that defileth, neither whatsoever 
worketh abomination or maketh a lie." (Rev. xxi:27). But it shall be a 
place of happy reunions. There shall we meet again the children who 
were removed from us in the beauty of their early life, and whom 
we have never forgotten through all the years that have passed. 

Heaven will be free from everything which curses and mars our 
life here. There will be no sin, no sickness, no pain, no poverty, no 
want, no death. There will be no sin, for everyone will obey the per- 
fect will of God. No poverty, for we shall be "heirs of God and joint 
heirs with Christ." No grinding toil. When we see men and women 
and even little children toil from morning till night beyond their 
strength, day after day, year after year, crushing all ambition and 
joy out of their bodies and souls, we rejoice and thank God that there 
is a place where the weary are at rest. "And God shall wipe away 
all tears from their eyes: and there shall be no more death, neither 
sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; for the 
former things have passed away." (Rev. xxi:4). No more pain or 
sickness, no more nights of anxious watching, no more sights that 
wring our hearts with pity. No deaths; no funerals passing through 
the streets, no cry of the mourner, no yawning grave waiting for its 
tenant. No death in the presence of the Prince of Life. 

Heaven will be a place of perfect knowledge. "Now we see 
through a glass darkly, but then face to face." Now we know in part, 
but our knowledge is faulty and limited. We are children in under- 
standing. But there, doubts and errors shall pass away and faith shall 
be swallowed up in sight. 

And heaven will be a place of perfect love. "We know that when 
He shall appear we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is." 
(I John iii:2). We shall be like Him, and He is love. How happy is 
the home where love is triumphant. It may be a lowly home, but it 
is the happiest place which our earth knows. Heaven is the home of 
eternal and perfect love. And it is an eternal city, for its maker and 
builder is God. 



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